I want, so much, to see more SFF where the...

Tuesday, August 7, 2012

“I want, so much, to see more SFF where the friendships between women are given as much time and attention as any other relationship. It does happen, but it’s still far too rare. I want women forging alliances. I want women as enemies, too. I want women grappling to understand each other across privilege and cultural gulfs. I want women having lots of friendships with other women. I want lonely women who long for friendships with other women. I want women with vastly different interests finding common touch-points. I want women bonding over fibre crafts and sport and science and children and war and travel and stand-up comedy and books and internet memes and everything else that women bond over in real life. I want women helping each other to survive in the direst of situations. I want women saving one another. I want women being horrible to each other – because of course women are also horrible to each other in real life, but it’s not some kind of special female superpower. I firmly believe that the only reason it becomes gendered is societal. SFF gives us the opportunity to go beyond that! SFF also gives us the opportunity to examine that in careful, nuanced detail. What I don’t want is women being horrible to each other because that’s “our nature”.”

- Alex Dally MacFarlane, from her essay Feminist SFF: Female Friendships.

(source link goes to her Tumblr, because she should be followed and with expediency)

I also want that in contemporary literature, but I doubleplus want it in my genre. ;)

(Source: alexdallymacfarlane)