Feminist Analyses

[TheSkeletonMan939]

Originally Posted by BabyTurtles

I agree :3 My little pony has 6 girls and even though theres spike(a boy) it doesn't focus on him as much as the others. theres like 4 seasons...and about 7 episodes(give or take) centered around him.

As a man I find this very offending. I am shocked and disgusted that a popular brand such as My Little Pony would carelessly disregard the potential that a male role can have in stories.

[plastroncafe]

Originally Posted by The Stryker

I'm creating the Masculist Analyses thread right nuh.

If only this were a real thing, and not some kind of sad attempt at sarcasm. I'd very much love to talk about how masculinity is portrayed in media.

[BabyTurtles]

Originally Posted by Cure

That makes My Little Pony sexist.

well....It could be....But I don't think it is...it just focuses on the girls more than the boys. Same with TMNT

TMNT is not just about kicking butt as ninjas it's about family.... it just happens to be an all boy family
.........plus April as a sister
My little Pony is about friendship, it just happens to be an all girl friendship ..........plus spike XD

sometimes cartoons just happen that way.

but....I don't think it's sexist..........as long as the girls(or boys) that do show up are cool I'm happy.
And there all plenty of other shows that have a mix between girls AND boys.....example Young Justice, Avatar the last airbender

all I'm saying is...shows don't always have to have a mix.....sometimes the story calls for more boys than girls...or vice versa..it just depends

[The Big Bad]

Originally Posted by Avatar Yuffie

It's good you bring up ATLA btw. Azula also had a crush in an episode, and she and Ty Lee talked about boys. Does this make her a weaker female? Did this emotion destroy her character? Hell no!

Of course not. Azula's brief flirtation with flirting is miles away from TMNT's treatment of Don's crush on April. First and most importantly, it's a story about HER. Donatello's crush is in no way a story about April—you could replace her with any other girl and still play the exact same beats. When it comes to their specific romance arcs, Azula is a subject—she acts--while April is an object—she is acted upon.

(Karai is in a position between the two, since she and Leo actually interact and flirt with one another. That said, the romance aspect of their relationship is still part of Leo's story more than it is Karai's, as we are privy to his thoughts where we aren't hers.)

Second, Azula's sex/romance life was only introduced after she'd already become a fully developed character with various different dimensions, and the way she dealt with romance was informed by her character and the context, which makes it more honest and less contrived than anything in TMNT. During “The Beach”, there is little question of just why Azula pursued a guy she'd never met before, and that's because we knew her well enough to know that she was doing it more as experiment (combined with some lust) than because of actual feelings for the jock.

Meanwhile, in TMNT, both April and Karai were introduced as love interests first and characters second, in ways that severely undermine the storytelling. With Donatello and April, the turtle's love at first sight thing undermines the idea of his interest as anything but his version of lust, which makes seem a) shallow, and b) insecure for not coming out and admitting it; both of those are key Nice Guy (TM) qualities, which I can guarantee is not the writers' intentions. With Karai and Leonardo, the fact that they act like they know each other after barely a minute of fighting strains disbelief, and yet we still get some stunningly artificial interaction because the writers thought it important to introduce the romance angle from the beginning.

Finally, the fact remains that unlike with TMNT, Azula's flirtations don't come across as something that occurs because Azula is a woman, but because Azula is Azula. Because the story has a million female characters—each with their own expressions of sexuality, some of which are expressed explicitly, and some which aren't—Azula's story does not carry the essentialist undertones it might have carried if she were the only woman in the show.

As for Don being a "Nice Guy" (I am sorry this word was corrupted, as there ARE genuinely kind men out there who does good things without expecting rewards from women for their work... Wolf in Sheep's clothing was the more honest expression),

That's what the capitalization is for--men who are only "nice" because they want and/or expect some sort of unstated reciprocation are Nice Guys. People who are genuinely nice and do nice things because they want to--like, say, the other three turtles--are nice guys.

unless Don made Rockwell attack him and made his brothers tease him so April will be sorry for him; or Don released those rats so he can save April, then no, I won't be all "think of the children" because of a one episode flowchart.

Except it's not one episode. It's taking candid pictures of April and them placing them as his desktop background without permission. It's using Metalhead to be able to leer at her unnoticed. It's asking for her phone number just for the thrill of being able to convince himself that her giving it to him was a sign that she held deeper feelings for him.

Now, let's look at the flowchart. The basic idea that it's meant to solve is, ostensibly, that Donatello wants to hang out more with April,which, as "problems" go, is one with one specific, obvious, and easy-to-implement solution: simply asking April if she'd like to hang out with him. If she does--which, given that they are friends, would logically be the case at least some of the time--hooray for him. If she doesn't, it means...well, it could mean tons of different things. Sure, it could be because she doesn't like Donatello, but it could just as easily mean that she has other things to do, or that she simply would like to spend some time alone—stuff that doesn't imply that she doesn't see Donatello as a friend, but does imply that that she has a life outside of him. Whatever the reason though for that “no” thought, there is only one appropriate response, if Donatello truly sees April as his friend: “I respect your decision regardless of my opinion on the matter and will not question.”

And yet, as Donatello's chart indicates, that is not his response to a “no”. Instead, his first instinct is to try and turn that “no” into a “yes” not by speaking his mind as one would a friend, but by saying whatever he thinks April wants to hear, regardless of its relationship to whatever may be considered the truth. In effect, he believes it's okay to lie to a woman and question her agency if you like her. And it the problems with this aren't obvious, then I just don't know what to say.

Now, it's clear that from the chart's complete absence in subsequent episodes that it wasn't something meant to be taken seriously—it was a one-episode running gag, nothing more. Except that actually makes it worse, since it means that the writers see that sort of behavior as innocuous and funny instead of problematic, and what's more, increases the probability that the audience will see it as something worthy of emulation rather than something to be unpacked and debunked.

Originally Posted by JLS

I think the major problem with female characters being underrepresented or only being seen as having romantic parts is due to TMNT premise itself. You already have 4 Turtles, Splinter, and Shredder, and they are all male and the show revolves around these 6 characters for a majority of the air time (at least 70%). I think the producers/writers might worry about giving too much "air time" to other characters outside of the 6 (whether they are male or female), because then it doesn't focus on the TMNT but more on those other characters and those 6 don't become the "main characters" anymore.

But it's not like mostly-female casts don't do this to males characters too (being underrepresented or only having romantic parts). One cartoon would be Sailor Moon, or in more grown-up shows/movies like UPN's Girlfriends, HBO's Sex And The City, and Waiting To Exhale. (Which are all good shows/movies by the way.)

When you already have 4 main characters in any show, it's difficult in trying to give them all equal "air time" and sometimes it may inadvertently come off as sexist when the show is trying to highlight the friendship/brotherhood/sisterhood aspect when the 4 main characters are all one gender.

While I'm always for strong, independent female characters in TMNT...I just don't see any character (male or female, weak or strong) having significant airtime in the future because you already have those 6 main characters crowding the show (who just so happened to be male), and unfortunately if the show spends too much time explaining/developing any character outside of those six (be it male or female)...it takes away the focus from the TMNT and the direction of the show changes.

(Holding breath as I'm about to get flamed, LOL )

The equivalence isn't quite equivalent, though. Shows like Sailor Moon, Powerpuff Girls, Friendship is Magic, and Sex and the City are definitively women led, but they rarely have the sort of gender-based disparities TMNT has. Sailor Moon, had one male character for every female character, at least in its first arc, which is the one I'm most familiar with—ditto for Winx Club. Powerpuff Girls had tons of men in its cast—according to TV Tropes' character page, they ended up outnumbering the girls, when all was said and done. The same is very rarely true in cartoons headlined by men. Heck, the problem here as we've noted, isn't as much with the main cast, but the fact that the supporting/recurring cast is also almost exclusively male.

Originally Posted by Cure

That makes My Little Pony sexist.

Nope--at least not in the way you imply: there's key differences between Friendship is Magic and TMNT which make all the difference in the world. The gender disparity in the former is limited to two very specific social circles--the main five and the Cutie Marks Crusaders--which are groups based on friendship. Like I said above,verywhere else, you're just as likely to see a male character as a female one, serving a variety of roles.

In TMNT, however, it's not just the main family unit that's overwhelmingly or exclusively male: it's also every other group, regardless of purpose or context. Ninjas? Overwhelmingly male. Mutagen victims? Exclusively male. Foot Clan? Overwhelmingly male, with the only exception having exceptional circumstances behind her inclusion. Purple Dragons? Exclusively male. NYPD? Exclusively male. Scientists? Exclusively male. Characters who save the world? Exclusively male. Bystanders? Overwhelmingly male. In fact, if we want to find a group that's largely or exclusively female, there's only one--love interests.

[Avatar Yuffie]

Originally Posted by The Big Bad

Of course not. Azula's brief flirtation with flirting is miles away from TMNT's treatment of Don's crush on April. First and most importantly, it's a story about HER. Donatello's crush is in no way a story about April—you could replace her with any other girl and still play the exact same beats. When it comes to their specific romance arcs, Azula is a subject—she acts--while April is an object—she is acted upon.

(Karai is in a position between the two, since she and Leo actually interact and flirt with one another. That said, the romance aspect of their relationship is still part of Leo's story more than it is Karai's, as we are privy to his thoughts where we aren't hers.)

Second, Azula's sex/romance life was only introduced after she'd already become a fully developed character with various different dimensions, and the way she dealt with romance was informed by her character and the context, which makes it more honest and less contrived than anything in TMNT. During “The Beach”, there is little question of just why Azula pursued a guy she'd never met before, and that's because we knew her well enough to know that she was doing it more as experiment (combined with some lust) than because of actual feelings for the jock.

Meanwhile, in TMNT, both April and Karai were introduced as love interests first and characters second, in ways that severely undermine the storytelling. With Donatello and April, the turtle's love at first sight thing undermines the idea of his interest as anything but his version of lust, which makes seem a) shallow, and b) insecure for not coming out and admitting it; both of those are key Nice Guy (TM) qualities, which I can guarantee is not the writers' intentions. With Karai and Leonardo, the fact that they act like they know each other after barely a minute of fighting strains disbelief, and yet we still get some stunningly artificial interaction because the writers thought it important to introduce the romance angle from the beginning.

Finally, the fact remains that unlike with TMNT, Azula's flirtations don't come across as something that occurs because Azula is a woman, but because Azula is Azula. Because the story has a million female characters—each with their own expressions of sexuality, some of which are expressed explicitly, and some which aren't—Azula's story does not carry the essentialist undertones it might have carried if she were the only woman in the show.




That's what the capitalization is for--men who are only "nice" because they want and/or expect some sort of unstated reciprocation are Nice Guys. People who are genuinely nice and do nice things because they want to--like, say, the other three turtles--are nice guys.

Except it's not one episode. It's taking candid pictures of April and them placing them as his desktop background without permission. It's using Metalhead to be able to leer at her unnoticed. It's asking for her phone number just for the thrill of being able to convince himself that her giving it to him was a sign that she held deeper feelings for him.

Now, let's look at the flowchart. The basic idea that it's meant to solve is, ostensibly, that Donatello wants to hang out more with April,which, as "problems" go, is one with one specific, obvious, and easy-to-implement solution: simply asking April if she'd like to hang out with him. If she does--which, given that they are friends, would logically be the case at least some of the time--hooray for him. If she doesn't, it means...well, it could mean tons of different things. Sure, it could be because she doesn't like Donatello, but it could just as easily mean that she has other things to do, or that she simply would like to spend some time alone—stuff that doesn't imply that she doesn't see Donatello as a friend, but does imply that that she has a life outside of him. Whatever the reason though for that “no” thought, there is only one appropriate response, if Donatello truly sees April as his friend: “I respect your decision regardless of my opinion on the matter and will not question.”

And yet, as Donatello's chart indicates, that is not his response to a “no”. Instead, his first instinct is to try and turn that “no” into a “yes” not by speaking his mind as one would a friend, but by saying whatever he thinks April wants to hear, regardless of its relationship to whatever may be considered the truth. In effect, he believes it's okay to lie to a woman and question her agency if you like her. And it the problems with this aren't obvious, then I just don't know what to say.

Now, it's clear that from the chart's complete absence in subsequent episodes that it wasn't something meant to be taken seriously—it was a one-episode running gag, nothing more. Except that actually makes it worse, since it means that the writers see that sort of behavior as innocuous and funny instead of problematic, and what's more, increases the probability that the audience will see it as something worthy of emulation rather than something to be unpacked and debunked.



The equivalence isn't quite equivalent, though. Shows like Sailor Moon, Powerpuff Girls, Friendship is Magic, and Sex and the City are definitively women led, but they rarely have the sort of gender-based disparities TMNT has. Sailor Moon, had one male character for every female character, at least in its first arc, which is the one I'm most familiar with—ditto for Winx Club. Powerpuff Girls had tons of men in its cast—according to TV Tropes' character page, they ended up outnumbering the girls, when all was said and done. The same is very rarely true in cartoons headlined by men. Heck, the problem here as we've noted, isn't as much with the main cast, but the fact that the supporting/recurring cast is also almost exclusively male.



Nope--at least not in the way you imply: there's key differences between Friendship is Magic and TMNT which make all the difference in the world. The gender disparity in the former is limited to two very specific social circles--the main five and the Cutie Marks Crusaders--which are groups based on friendship. Like I said above,verywhere else, you're just as likely to see a male character as a female one, serving a variety of roles.

In TMNT, however, it's not just the main family unit that's overwhelmingly or exclusively male: it's also every other group, regardless of purpose or context. Ninjas? Overwhelmingly male. Mutagen victims? Exclusively male. Foot Clan? Overwhelmingly male, with the only exception having exceptional circumstances behind her inclusion. Purple Dragons? Exclusively male. NYPD? Exclusively male. Scientists? Exclusively male. Characters who save the world? Exclusively male. Bystanders? Overwhelmingly male. In fact, if we want to find a group that's largely or exclusively female, there's only one--love interests.

I think you are being too hard on April. You're telling me she's an object, not a character, just "Don's love interest" when the show has not even told us her whole story yet.

Can you just ease up a bit? I can't help thinking you're criticizing her character is because she is one of the two girls and she didn't fill your "positive feminine quota" pedestal.

Azula didn't have that problem because she wasn't "the only girl" in that show. ATLA has Katara and Toph as main characters, so even if Azula was not in the episode, there'd still be girls contributing in the plot. Azula has two female friends as her hench women, so she has no stigma as the "bad girl" but Azula was NEVER THE big bad of the show. True, she serves as Zuko's foil, but she was also in the shadow of their father.

The thing that got going for her is that she has a very ruthless personality, is extremely clever liar, a good fighter and kicks the literal butts of her enemies, her having "other dimensions", especially her very deep mommy complex and she actually LIKED her friends, only occurred in season 3, so I have no idea what you're talking about. Honestly, I find her conquering Ba Sing Se a little contrived and full of lucky coincidences. It could have all been undone if Sokka just bothered to look at them.

Now, I'm glad you don't think her wanting to know what having a "normal" crush would be like is not demeaning to her character, that's great. What I am asking you if Azula is a guy, would you be all over his case for coming onto a female crush, who got afraid of him? I noticed you are excusing her behavior for said jock.

ATLA has solid female characters, but a part of me is sad Suki and Ty Lee are rather flat... Suki especially since she's part of the group and Sokka's girlfriend.

As for your Don hating... please stop. Look at the other episodes and show me his April desktop. Show me the scenes after Monkey Brains he hangs out with her is all thanks to his flowchart. And Metalhead has been out of commission after its debut, I'd be really disappointed if Don wanted it fixed so he can look at her without her knowledge. If he was doing this crush like Helga from Hey, Arnold! as in collecting April's bubblegum so he can make her face sculpture enshrined in his closet, then I'll share your sentiment his crush is unhealthy and being a creeper.

So for now, it's not. At least not for me. You may be outraged by that Metalhead oggling scene, but I got secondhand embarrassment because Don keeps making a fool out of himself.

Finally, I can't comment much about Karai, because I really don't know what she really thinks about Leo. But please don't call her "just a love interest" because... she really isn't. By Alien Agenda Leo decided, or at least lied to himself, to put his feelings for her on hold, so this should no longer be a problem for you.