Lesbian Cliche FAQ - Final (tentative)

[AutumnT]

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And I can understand why they would care about her in particular. My point was that the character was not defined solely by her sexual preference. My brother is gay, but there are about 9 other words I'd use to describe him before I got to gay (professor, mountan climber, short, goofy. et.c).

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[/quote:2d6736a8c5] And more than likely those 9 other words would never get him beat up for no reason or denied basic rights that straight people have. And those 9 other things are probably represented quite well on television. But that one thing? Not so much. That one thing is NOT reflected. That one thing is what kids growing up in a world that seems to hate them need more than ANYTHING to see reflected.

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Right on there, but I think that probably had more to do with contracts, number of eps, et.c. Buffy's Mom was never in the credits.

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[/quote:2d6736a8c5] Again you are missing the point. Amber Benson was in more episodes than Seth Green. In more episodes than Marc Blucas. They were in the credits. Anything to do with "contracts, etc." is ME's fault. It could have been corrected you'r acting like they had no control. That's silly.

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Minus network censorship, Willow and Tara weren't written any differently than a hetero couple on the series.

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[/quote:2d6736a8c5] Actually they were. They suffered more. And one died. And one went evil. Willow even described them as "lesbian gay type lovers", sorry but this is a typical straight argument. "I did not see them as gay" - well good for you. We did.

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I'm not asking you to shut up, I'm just saying that good work deserves credit.

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[/quote:2d6736a8c5] And I'm saying it was not good work. It was ruined by what they did. This is another typical argument. That we should just be happy with the scraps we got. I can't even stand to watch many episodes I once loved knowing how it all ended. And especially knowing how these pricks LIED REPEATEDLY to the gay community about this relationship. How they sucked up the kudos of the gay press and said Tara was not going anywhere and that the heart of the show was emotionally a safe place. While all the time they were planning her death. For TWO YEARS while they lied. So, I will not give them credit.

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True, but the purpose of the show is to tell the writers stories, and if they felt they needed to kill Tara to do it properly, I won't argue.

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[/quote:2d6736a8c5] Well, that's the difference between you and me then. I watch television critically. And when something is poorly thought out or written I will say so. Not just go "oh well, writer knows best". Writers are not gods. They are people who make mistakes and this was a huge one.

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Why? Because the writers felt like it would make the best story.

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[/quote:2d6736a8c5] And they were wrong.

[emma peel]

AutumnT,thanks for the articulate manner in which you "shoot holes" through certain peoples arguments. When I see posts by relativelnewbieswithlotsofposts, (especially ones that I don't agree with), my brain shuts down, it goes "uhhhh," I get pissed off and can't think, much less speak
AutumnT, thanks for being here to speak for me when I can't get anything out.
Janice
Edited to add that I think it's great that we can disagree with one another here, in a respectful manner. I love the Kitten Board.!

[urnofosiris]

Podko, perhaps you would be so kind as to read the FAQ so you'll know how to quote, it would make reading your post easier.

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And I can understand why they would care about her in particular. My point was that the character was not defined solely by her sexual preference. My brother is gay, but there are about 9 other words I'd use to describe him before I got to gay (professor, mountan climber, short, goofy. et.c).

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[/quote:55d8f10b7e]

You did not have to make that point, believe it or not we actually knew that already, but Tara being a lesbian is somewhat higher than number nine on [b:55d8f10b7e] my[/b:55d8f10b7e] list to describe her.

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Right on there, but I think that probably had more to do with contracts, number of eps, et.c. Buffy's Mom was never in the credits

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[/quote:55d8f10b7e]

The reason Amber Benson was never in the credits was because Joss Whedon had decided very early on that Tara was going to die and nothing would change his mind about that, not the homophobes screaming for her death, nor the gay youth who told him how much she means to them.

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Well, I wasn't being literal. Of course she was gay. I'm just saying that it was refreshing that there was more to the character than the fact she was gay. Minus network censorship, Willow and Tara weren't written any differently than a hetero couple on the series

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[/quote:55d8f10b7e]

Yes, very refreshing, it would also have been refreshing if she had not ended up dead. The censorship really negates ME's argument that they were treated [b:55d8f10b7e] equally[/b:55d8f10b7e] and that they were just treated like the other heterosexual "individuals".

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I'm not asking you to shut up, I'm just saying that good work deserves credit.

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[/quote:55d8f10b7e]

Tell that to Amber Benson.
We praised Joss Whedon for the good he did, for the things he said in his interviews, but as it turns out all those things were LIES. But we praised his good work back when it was good, and now we criticize his work when it has gone bad, how dare we.

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True, but the purpose of the show is to tell the writers stories, and if they felt they needed to kill Tara to do it properly, I won't argue

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[/quote:55d8f10b7e]

Well hey good for you, but I [b:55d8f10b7e] will[/b:55d8f10b7e] argue, seeing as proper is the last way I would use to describe this story.

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Why? Because the writers felt like it would make the best story. As for the method of death, I agree they should have found a better way

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[/quote:55d8f10b7e]

But the writers also found shooting her through the heart with the miracle bullet the best way to kill Tara, but it is ok if we object to that is it? Seeing as you do agree with that. Could it be that maybe the writers are not perfect, that maybe they did not tell the best story in this case? Could it also be that maybe, just maybe they should not have been telling lies for 2 years and spitting in our faces afterwards? Please tell me how it is, you seem to know what life is about better than I do.

[relativegirl]

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If you believe that gays should be represented realistically on television, then you can't cry foul when they die. It's part of life. I understand the frustration, because realistic gay couples are rare on television

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[/quote:8f0e9343e4]
Yaknow [b:8f0e9343e4] Podko[/b:8f0e9343e4], the day I see a lesbian murdered on tv and I can just flip the channel and see another realistic, long-term lesbian couple on another show is the day you get to tell me not to "cry foul." If I had gotten upset when Buffy killed Angel or Angel killed Jenny I could have turned to any other show on any other channel and found straight couples to entertain me. But I don't get to do that when Tara dies, do I?

You say you understand my frustration b/c realistic gay couples on tv are rare? [i:8f0e9343e4] rare?[/i:8f0e9343e4] What amazing cable package do you have that realistic lesbian couples are merely [i:8f0e9343e4] rare?[/i:8f0e9343e4] Cuz baby I gotta upgrade to that package.

Long-term, realistic lesbian couples are not [i:8f0e9343e4] rare[/i:8f0e9343e4] on my tv. Thanks to Joss, they are now non-existent.

Lesbians on tv are murdered or they commit suicide or they go crazy or they become criminals. Lesbians in real life suffer and do the same things. But not all of us, thankfully not even most of us, and not right after we have sex. Tara died right after she had sex with her girlfriend. Was the FAQ in any way unclear that we are offended by more than just the [i:8f0e9343e4] fact[/i:8f0e9343e4] that Tara died? Did you skim over the part about the importance of the circumstances leading up to Tara's death? You know, the part about how the cliche' is gay sex=death. Not just death? It's an important distinction.

It is possible for a tv show to have a storyline in which a lesbian dies and not perpetuate an ugly stereotype, an offensive cliche. Wish I could give you an example of a tv show that has done that, but I can't. Gee, do you think that's maybe our point?

Lest you think I "cry foul" every time a lesbian dies on tv, I do not ever recall feeling outraged when I saw a lesbian die of old age. Of course, I can't recall the last time I saw a lesbian on tv live that long either.

[xita]

I am just going to say one thing.

Yes, Willow and Tara were [b:807b094da2]the first[/b:807b094da2] realistically treated gay couple, and lesbians. And that is why this is an outrage. To go so far and to kill it all just like everyone else did. It is worse than Ally Mcbeal, worse than Friends. This is more damaging than anything else that television has done. They destroyed the best thing to happen to gay people on screen. Why? WhY? FOR 3 EPISODES! It's wrong and lesbians have no other place to turn to see their lives fairly represented. In the end the gay people who were most like you ended up miserable, just like all the movies, all your family, all your friends who told you being gay meant living a sad life. It's a crime.

[Sheridan]

[b:460d503132] Podko[/b:460d503132] I am a straight white male so I have no personal investment in W/T as a gay relationship, but it is clear to me you really don't get. ME got lots of Kudos for W/T and positively revelled in, even though Joss had apparently long since decided Tara was going to die. They earned those accolades under false pretences. Should any character be immune from being killed off? Not usually no, but when they are part of something which is unique on TV maybe you should think twice. Simply to say you didn't intend them to be some sort of icon as ME have doesn't absolve you of repsonibility for what actually happened. And in fact Amber as an actress has been treated far diffrently from other recurring personnel. Noone else has had their character written out when they were still happy to be on the show.

As to the story telling give me a break. I may not be Shakespeare but I know a bad story when I see it. This was the sacrifice of major character for a 3 episode story arc that was full of holes. If you want an example if Xander had smacked his head against that tombstone a little harder who was going to talk Willow down? Or the fact that in a show called 'Buffy The vampire Slayer' she did basically nothing in the last 20 minutes of the finale. Even ignoring the holes it seemed forced and pointless, in fact if you can tell me what the point of the story was I would be grateful because I'm damned if I can see it.

[Katharyn]

*Shakes head*

*Sighs*

*Hugs all the Kittens - yeah that is alot of hugging...*

*Walks off into the darkness - there was supposed to be a sunset... but we got darkness.*

Katharyn
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[Killin Joke]

Sorry for interrupting what seems to be a heated discussion, but I wanted to post something positive (for a change), I read in Humo today (Belgian magazine, a bit intellectual). It's a small interview with people who actually "get" it, about the movie Bound. It's on Canvas, wednesday, the 17th, at 21:00, for all you Dutch (or satellite-wired) kitties, who haven't seen it yet. I don't know whether this is the right place, so if the moderators figure it's rather appropriate in the "Other lesbians in the media" thread or something, feel free to move it. I'll try to translate into English as fluently as possible.
___________________________________________________
'Bound': Out of love for a woman

For the brothers Wachowski became world-famous with 'The Matrix', they made their debut with the dark crime picture 'Bound': gangster-sweetie Violet seduices her neighbour Corky, steals a heap of money from the local mob and drive into the sunset. Nothing to write home about you will say, but that's if you don't take into account the Wachowski's artistic feel, not to mention the steamy scenes between Jennifer Tilly and Gina Gershon.

Larry Wachowski: "We wanted to make 'Bound' into a sexy film noir, with a lot of humour and very strong female characters, and we were so naieve to believe long rows of actresses would be lining up to get to play Violet and Corky. Apparently not: when they got to the sex scene, our supercool script usually flew out of the window immediately. We received aproximately twenty rejecting phonecalls a day: go figure what a black list of actresses we have (grins)."

Gina Gershon (Corky): "Everybody advised me not to do "Bound": I had just portraited a foul-mouthed nymfomaniac in "Showgirls" and now I was going to play a lesbian ex-criminal ? But when I had met Larry and Andy and their wives, I knew right away I had to do it. The manner in which they had invented their characters, sprang from an infinite respect for women.
The, uhm, hot scenes with Violet had to be recorded in one take, which is to say: fuck a couple of days in a row with twenty men around you (laughs hard). But it was fun to do that with a woman: between takes we were just talking about shoestores and the likes. And women amongst each other also understand when you say things as "lay your hand here, then they won't see this roll of fat' or 'don't do that, this way you're crushing my breast too much (laughs)."

- According to you, doesn't the happy end take down the dark undertone of 'Bound' ?
Gershon: "On the contrary. In the beginning I still thought 'Ah, it'll probably become a wacky cultfilm', but actually it's far more commercial than I had dared to think. When I saw "Thelma and Louise", I was furious they died at the end of the film. It's pretty nice women too can get everything they want."
___________________________________________________Ooh, I so love Gina, even more now I read her reaction to the last question. It's good to discover the Wachowski's actually treat women with respect: Whedon should have taken notes...

[xita]

That's right that's what makes Bound so great, they lived.

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We received aproximately twenty rejecting phonecalls a day: go figure what a black list of actresses we have (grins)."

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[/quote:dd58b53cd5]

that I loved. Considering how big these guys are now!! hee

[urnofosiris]

Well they can always put Amber and Aly on their casting list.

[roamin]

Podko I wouldn't foul" if lesbian couples were realistically and proportionately portrayed on television.

According to the US census the GLBT population is about the equivalent of the Asian population - and this is recognized to be an undercount - and interestingly enough it has more buying power (hear that UPN and advertisers).

Other than Willow and Tara how many fully developed lesbian characters are there on TV? If Xander, Dawn, Buffy, Anya and Joyce dies all a viewer has to do is change the channel to find other similar, fully developed characters to identify with, A gay, or for that matter straight teen doesn't have that option, and that's why I'm calling foul.

In a social climate where kids grow up calling anything they don't like "gay", where anyone different is labeled a "fag", where a teen once told me "thank god no one in my family is gay" but couldn't explain to my why being gay was a bad thing Willow and Tara did a lot of good. They did a lot of good because they were fully developed characters who "happened to be gay" and not a one shot special episode. They could have done a lot more good, but instead Joss decided that a few episodes of evil Willow, followed by more episodes of guilty Willow in need of redemption was more important, and hey maybe if I had the option to change the channel and see another cool lesbian couple I wouldn't be so disappointed in Joss and Co. After all they killed off Joyce, whom I loved as much as Tara and I wasn't nearly as upset. The difference - I can change the channel and see other great grown up, women who are fully developed characters.

[friskylez]

When Bound first came out (no pun intended ) I heard about the "lesbian scenes" and had to see it..I ended up going to the theater and seeing it 6 times.. That just about sums up how many movies there were with lesbians as
the lead characters in the 90s...The only other places you could see lesbians portrayed in movies when this film was released were the independant films, such as Go Fish, The Positively True Adventures of two girls in love, Bar Girls etc...

Bound may have been an independant film at the time, but it was released nationally, i could be wrong but i dont think the other films mentioned were released nationally..I remember the others or at least Go Fish being shown at the Gay and Lesbian film festival in SF....Anyway, there were scores of people in the theater every time i went to see Bound, what was great was there were straight couples, lesbians, gays, young and old....At the end of the movie, every time i went to see it, people stood up and applauded..Ya dont see that happen every day..

My point is the Warchowski (spelling) brothers took a chance and made "their" film and it was a commercial success, Gina Gershon and Jennifer Tilly took a chance and played these parts..I even remember that there was talk of an Oscar nomination for the movie, read something in one of the papers in SF and Ive kept the article all these years....Alas it didnt get the nomination, but it did get recognized by the critics and public as well...

I love the fact that the "W" brothers went on to more success with the Matrix and that they have alot of respect for women, so much so that the lesbians got the money, each other and lived happily ever after or at least rode off into the sunset together........Alive....

[Podko]

Obviously, I'm not going to change anyone's opinion on the mattter. There are so many points I'd like to rebut, but it's getting dirty, and this isn't the place for anyone who feels anything other than what the FAQ states.
I do think though, that your passion for this has made you instenstive to others. Referring to Whedon as a straight white guy as evidence that he couldn't possibly understand what killing Tara meant is scary. I don't "worship" the man, I think this season was the weakest yet, but if the writers chose that storyline, it's their right, just as it's your right to raise object over it. Too bad y'all weren't able to discuss a dissenting opinion in a civil manner.

[emma peel]

friskylez, I too saw Bound,originally just cause I heard it was about lesbians. I didn't expect much, but WHOA, did I jump up in my seat (for more reasons than just looking at Gina Gershon and Jennifer Tilly). I thought it was a really nifty film noir coming out of left field that was done really well and didn't lay a commercial egg.(Listening Joss?)
What was really funny was that Susie Bright was the "Lesbian Sex Consultant" for the film (I kid you not!), and played a cameo to boot, and in the ending credits for both).(Still listening, Joss?)
I found an article Susie wrote about the film,but didn't want to post it here,cause it might be a bit inappropriate.But if you google with Susie Bright,Lesbian Sex Consultant, you can find it right away.
I thought it was neat that a couple of guys could do a film about lesbians darn well.
Janice
Edited to add due to some more recent comments that the W brothers are evidently "straight guys" as they are both married.P.S. I think John Sayles(Lianna) is cool,too.

[xita]

[b:8691437f5b] it's their right, just as it's your right to raise object over it. [/b:8691437f5b]

Ok, so why are you here trying to tell us not to object ot it?

Oh and obviously you missed the discussions right around you where we are talking about how 2 straight white guys, got it right.

[kpmuse]

Podko,

I saw very civil and restrained Kittens. There is tremendous anger here, and I see people taking their time and trying to educate you. We know your opinion very well. We've heard it many times and we totally hear what you are saying. We feel differently for the reasons stated, and the Kittens are trying to tell you why. And very well I might add!

It seems that YOU are not willing to be open minded to our opinion. If you really want to understand and feel what we are saying, come back.

If not, thanks for stopping by and have a nice day!

[WebWarlock]

Podko,

I am a straight white guy and I do get it.
But the fact is that neither Joss nor I will EVER truely understand. Niether one of us has EVER had to deal with what this population has.

The difference between him and me is when I say I get it, I am understood to be saying "in my own limited capacity I understand and I want to learn more". Joss is saying he understands and still does the same crap the TV and movie types have been doing from DAY FREAKING ONE.

Joss does not get the benefit of the doubt here. He can not talk to gay teens or Out magazine and accept their praise and then pretend not to understand when the reaction tunrs ugly. He either knows then and now or he never knew. Either way he was lying then or he is lying now.

I could go into your points again, but you came here with YOUR mind made up. This is not the place for you tell us we are wrong. We might be blinded by rage, but that rage come from something.

Run along now to the other boards and tell them how insensitive and closed minded the Kittens are. I could care a fuck less.

Warlock

[Elianna]

[quote:8f4bd6e019][b:8f4bd6e019][i:8f4bd6e019]Quote:[/i:8f4bd6e019][/b:8f4bd6e019]

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but the purpose of the show is to tell the writers stories, and if they felt they needed to kill Tara to do it properly, I won't argue.

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[/quote:8f4bd6e019]

I thought that the primary purpose of a tv show is to entertain. To inform maybe, but they need to entertain us (the audience) to do so.

If the main purpose of tv is to let writers tell stories, why don't I have a tv show? I would have the chance to work through issues, etc. But they wouldn't be entertaining to anyone else, and that is the point.

Yes, the writers can write whatever they want, but when they start thinking that killing a lesbian in such a manner is entertaining, and that I should enjoy it, that's when I object. And I don't need anyone tell me what I should feel, or how I should react. I have my own feelings and reactions, and that's what makes me an individual.

I also am not the most eloquent person, so sorry for taking so long to say, essentially, "I agree with Autumn".

-Elianna

[tyche]

[quote:91105e574d][b:91105e574d][i:91105e574d]Quote:[/i:91105e574d][/b:91105e574d]

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And I'm saying it was not good work. It was ruined by what they did. This is another typical argument. That we should just be happy with the scraps we got. I can't even stand to watch many episodes I once loved knowing how it all ended.

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[/quote:91105e574d]
Exactly. I am grateful, and I know everyone else on this board is grateful also, for the way in which W/T were depicted for two and a half years. Did ME go far enough in terms of sexual frankness? Frankly, no. And I think that this was mostly due to timidity on the part of the networks. If W/T had been shown having full-on sex prior to SR (not floaty metaphor sex, enjoyable though that is to watch), I think that the end of that episode would be marginally less offensive and cliched.
But imo it is ludicrous to say that the destruction of W/T doesn't matter b/c of the way they were depicted prior to the end of season 6. By that logic, I might as well go and scribble over the face of the Mona Lisa with a magic marker, then claim that the painting's new look doesn't matter, b/c it was a pretty picture while it lasted.
You know, if ME had been honest from the beginning that they were going to have nothing but cliched and negative portrayals of gay and lesbian characters on their shows, then fair enough. I just wouldn't have got emotionally involved in the W/T storyline. (And btw, I am a straight woman, and I get it. I very much get it. I get it so much that I want to get the lesbian cliche FAQ tatooed on Joss Whedon's backside. But I digress.)
But they lied. They said that Tara and W/T mattered to them, [b:91105e574d] and they didn't[/b:91105e574d]. After all, happy lesbians aren't nearly as much of a ratings draw as romanticised rapists.

[Sheridan]

Thats what makes it worse. the way they emphasised the Tara wasn't going anywhere. If ME had kept their mouths shut people would be upset but they wouldn't feel stabbed in the back

[urnofosiris]

Ah darn it podko, so we're not only pass, we're uncivil as well, isn't that convenient, saves you the trouble of having to counter our unreasonable thoughtless arguments. Well too bad, that's life for you.
And yes isn't sarcasm a bitch, unless it is Joss Whedon using it, then it is cool I guess, he is the writer, it is his right. I am however happy to hear it is our right to disagree after all, that is not the impression I got from your first post.

[BBOvenGuy]

All the stuff that's been coming out lately - especially from Amber's appearance in Toronto - has led me to revise my opinion of Joss and Mutant Enemy. Once upon a time, I thought they were visionaries who wanted to help make a better world. Then I thought they were egotistical jerks. But now?

Now I see them as a bunch of Hollywood bumblers who never had any idea what it was that they'd created.

I remember being at Comic Con a year ago. I was watching as Xita went up to Joss Whedon and thanked him for Willow and Tara. He had the oddest look on his face - it was full of confusion. At the time, I thought it was just because he was strung out from signing too many autographs with his burned hands. Now I think it's because he never really understood exactly what it was that Xita was thanking him for.

Willow and Tara were never supposed to get together in Joss's original vision of the series storyline. Willow needed a lover who could die at a certain moment in order to send her down into the grip of dark magic. Tara was available, and the characters had some chemistry. So did the actresses. And so Joss decided it would be "cool" to make Tara Willow's next lover.

And then something happened. Willow and Tara became more than just two characters on a TV show. The actresses made them more than that. The fans made them more than that. And Joss Whedon went along, because it was good publicity for the show and he liked getting all the attention. But did he really understand what he was doing? Recent developments make it pretty clear that he didn't.

Why do I say that? Because in the end, it was "Joss's will be done" on the show. Tara had to die. If Joss had really understood what had happened, he wouldn't have gone ahead with his original vision.

Whenever someone is engaged in a creative activity - music, art, writing, whatever - there are times when the creative work transcends anything the artist is capable of doing alone. It's a magnificent gift whenever this happens. Ray Bradbury has referred to it as the Zen of writing. Madeleine L'Engle has compared it to the Virgin Mary being told she'd been chosen to bring Christ into the world. Whatever your philosophy or your spirituality, it is one of those moments every creative person seeks. It's what makes all the struggle and hard work of being creative worthwhile.

But whenever this happens, the most important thing the artist must do is [b:89b62c93a9] get out of the way[/b:89b62c93a9]. Ray Bradbury would have you put a sign over your desk that says "DON'T THINK!" Madeleine L'Engle would have you say the same thing that Mary told the angel Gabriel, "Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word." Again, regardless of what terms you use to express your philosophy or spirituality, the message is the same. Get yourself out of the way. Leave your ego at the door. Serve the work. Any willful attempt to make the work serve you will crush the precious gift you've been given.

Too bad Joss Whedon didn't listen. He had no room in his universe for anything that transcended his own vision and abilities. It was Joss's will be done. "Here am I, the servant of [b:89b62c93a9] myself[/b:89b62c93a9]; let it be with me according to [b:89b62c93a9] my[/b:89b62c93a9] word."

And he still doesn't understand why people are so upset with him. He doesn't understand why people aren't grateful for the two years he allowed the Willow/Tara relationship to go on. He doesn't understand why people don't see that he was simply treating Willow and Tara as individuals, not as lesbians.

The whole "I treated them as individuals, not as lesbians," is the same kind of pseudo-egalitarian doublespeak that opponents of Affirmative Action use. "We just want to treat everyone equally," is the claim we hear time after time from people who want to eliminate programs that give extra help to African-Americans, Latinos and other minorities that our society marginalizes. I wonder how Joss feels about parroting Rush Limbaugh.

The whole "treat everyone as individuals" argument only works if the playing field is level to begin with. Otherwise, competition between the haves and the have-nots is about as "equal" as it would be if I tried to play a game of one-on-one basketball against Shaquille O'Neal. If I don't get some sort of help, I've got no chance of winning. And neither do any minorities who start out so far behind the rest of us.

Willow and Tara are individuals, yes. But they're also lesbians. When a heterosexual couple is destroyed on TV, straight people have dozens of other heterosexual couples in which they can invest their time and emotions. Willow and Tara stood alone, the only long-term same-sex couple on television. Now that they're gone, who do gay people have to turn to? Nobody.

The Willow/Tara relationship was a tremendous gift that Joss had no idea how to handle. And now that his willful actions have destroyed it, he has no idea how to deal with the people who are angry with him. He doesn't even really seem to understand why anyone is angry. And that's just plain sad.

And golly gee, I seem to have written another essay. Oh well...

[urnofosiris]

Oh Bob go on, you raging mad lesbian you

[Lindy]

Oh, BBOvenGuy, I loved your random essay (is that an oxymoron? hm).

And I have a wonderfull image of a confused, silly looking Joss now. "What? You thank me? Uh? Help, I am not getting it, I didn't do anything, they just fill screentime."

[Ben Varkentine]

I'm lucky in some ways. Though I agree too much of ME's work on BUFFY this season was bad, it hasn't ruined the experience of watching the first five seasons for me.

But the weirdest thing to me about this board and the whole thing is the way that some of us are staking ME one minute...and quoting them the next. That's the weird thing; we know, obviously, that the feelings we have for the characters of Willow and Tara don't come just from AH and AB's performances, as excellent as they were. It comes from the ME writers, the other people who made up W & T, and the very people who agreed to tear them apart in such a mistaken way.

I think this is what Whedon is talking about when he says that killing Tara is as or more painful for him as it is for any of us. Yes, he's a white, affulent male. He's also the white, affulent male who created Tara and wrote and/or directed many of the moments over the past couple of years that enchanted us with her. As much as some of us want to believe it, you *can't* create characters that so resonate with other people and not have big parts of yourself rattling around in there. You just can't.

None of which explains to my satisfaction his decisons this season, but it helps to grey the lines between black and white.

Someone made the promising comparison of putting a moustache on the Mona Lisa, which would obviously be a negative thing to do if someone who bought the rights to show it to others did so. It would also be an inexplicable thing to do if Leonardo did it himself, but he would have the right if anyone did.

As his patrons would then have the right to decide that the couldn't trust him not to muck up his own work, and take their business elsewhere.

[Sheridan]

It is sad that Joss acheived what most writers strive a lifetime to do, create something that is iconic, that takes on alife of its own. Confronted with this waht does Joss do? He shrugs his shoulders and burns it down. The 'treating everyone as an individual' argument is great if TV(and real life for that matter) were fair, equal and just. And Joss still hasn't explained why anyone with a skin tone darker than a light tan lasts about five minutes on Buffy.

[relativegirl]

Go Bob Go! And apparently when I applaud you I am supposed to reference the fact that you are a white straight man as making this reference somehow makes me scary. Not sure that I understand the logic of how this makes me scary, but if Autumn can do it and be scary, I shall follow in her footsteps.

[Dave V]

I cannot fully understand how much Willow and Tara have meant to those in the GLBT community, but I do try. I miss both their relationship and the lost opportunity ME had to tell a beautiful story.

I have tried to discuss this with those close to me and with other Buffy fans. I've been told to my face that the Kittens' anger with Joss et. al. is "spiteful."

Well, yeah.

We've been lied to, repeatedly. ME staffers have revelled in our pain. Our intelligence has been insulted by the plea to "dramatic necessity." Good actresses have been forced to act out a trifling, cliched storyline.

Bob, you have given me a totally new insight into ME - they knew not what they wrought!

It makes me look at the entirety of their work in a new light. Whatever success, brilliance, and good they accomplished was DESPITE their best laid plans, eh?

The fans are supposed to be grateful for whatever scraps they leave us. Bullshit. It's all tainted, now.

[roamin]

Podko when we feel like debating issues and educating people, we go to other boards and partake in the conversations there.

The Kitten Board is a haven, a place where we don't have to constantly defend our point of view.

I actually do understand a lot of the points you are trying to make - this is a very complex issue, at the heart of which is a debate about social responsibility vs creativity and as BBOvenGuy so eloquently put it being able to recognize when your art and it's impact becomes bigger than your vision.

It seems that the message we are getting this week is "shut up and be grateful for what you had"

We are grateful - but by giving us the wonderful present of Willow and Tara it really just pointed put how little we had and it made us hungry for more. It made us realize that equality in all parts of life is what is important, not being patted on the head and being told we should be grateful.

I'll say this for Joss and ME - they've pulled me out of my complacent bourgeois life and made be realize how important it is for me to be vocal, and critical and most of all to get back to working with youth and making a difference - however small - in their lives and attitudes.

[urnofosiris]

[quote:593dea5340][b:593dea5340][i:593dea5340]Quote:[/i:593dea5340][/b:593dea5340]

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I'll say this for Joss and ME - they've pulled me out of my complacent bourgeois life and made be realize how important it is for me to be vocal, and critical...

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[/quote:593dea5340]

Well I realize that too, not thanks to Joss Whedon, but thanks to the people on this board. It would not surprise me if a few months from now he is patting himself on the back for having created this discussion as if he intended it in the first place and merits praise for it, as if he has made *us* aware of these issues instead of vice versa.