From the other point of view, the Real Life section and the Troper Tales secation have been used to complain about feminsm of any kind (even down to the watered down version shown in Jezebel. Yes, really.), not to mention that YES it is that rare in real life. If the natter is that much if a problem, I'd either ban any deeper analysis or Kill It with Fire. I'd be glad to see it go, frankly.
They see me troll'n
Watered down? Rare? Yeah, see, that's why the Straw Feminist page is full of arguments.
It should probably be deleted, that trope will never turn out pretty.
My other signature is a Gundam.
Well, first I would like to hear exactly what an acceptable feiminst is, if that isn't?
Zzzzzzzzzz
Look, the problem is that people refuse to treat this as a trope, and keep trying to make it about real life.
A Straw Feminist is a character who's feminist views are established solely so that they can be proven to be wrong.
That's it. It doesn't have to be extreme radical feminism. It doesn't have to be realistic feminism.
Ruthlessly pare out the essays and the "in real life" 's, and the distribes about whether this brand of feminism is acceptable or not. Cut it down to the fundamental: A character whose feminist position or views are established solely so that they can be proven wrong.
...if you don’t love you’re dead, and if you do, they’ll kill you for it.
That could work. We will have to fix the descriptions, though. I have a feeling that the paralells drawn to real life there could be to blame.
Zzzzzzzzzz
That is the description. Anything else is trimmings.
She's not a straw feminist because she wears cammo and has a short haircut, or because she spells "women" as "womyn" or has a job. She's a straw feminist because her feminism exists only to be defeated. All the rest of it can go, the same way You Fail Economics Forever was chopped down from 23 paragraphs explaining all the ways that a fictional economic system could be wrong to
Stories, especially in role playing games and speculative fiction, tend to have economies that simply wouldn't work under any real world economic system. Nobody gets paid but everybody has all the money they need; economies are stable despite huge amounts of gold and jewels being dumped into them (or taken out of them) on a regular basis; or "we don't use money any more" ... the list goes on and on... \\
Please see Useful Notes.Economics for a list of errors that frequently occur in works of fiction and a more detailed explanation of economic theories. Sunk Cost Fallacy is a common sub-trope of this.
edited 23rd Sep '10 12:50:40 PM by Madrugada
...if you don’t love you’re dead, and if you do, they’ll kill you for it.
You gotta get yourself some marble columns
The trouble is, off the wiki the term "strawfeminist" isgenerally used to refer to a specific caricature of feminism. I don't think the name is bad, but it does somewhat imply that particular caricature, while the trope is "when an author introduces a 'feminist' forthe sole purpose of showing feminism to be wrong."
A trope-Straw Feminist who isn't a caricature-strawfeminist is more likely to strike back than one who is, though.
edited 23rd Sep '10 3:06:14 PM by HersheleOstropoler
The child is father to the man —Oedipus
The Master
"A Straw Feminist is a character who's feminist views are established solely so that they can be proven to be wrong." See, that is probably what the trope should be, but that isn't how it is written right now. Right now the description makes it sound like the trope is about feminists portrayed negatively, and the description goes out of its way to claim that most real feminists aren't like that (I'm not going to argue whether that is true or not, it isn't constructive). My recommendation was to remove the straw part and just make a trope about feminism in fiction and keep real life out of it.
Edit: To be more clear, I don't think most people who write these types of characters are actually trying to make a political point, and thus don't fit the definition of straw given on this wiki. Most of them are just making fun of what they perceive actual feminists act like.
edited 23rd Sep '10 3:19:22 PM by Drolyt
I trimmed it. Nothing at all lost. The examples list gives all the examples needed.
Goal: Clear, Concise and Witty
Okay, now that's a little too blunt.
"The difference between reality and fiction is that fiction has to make sense." - Tom Clancy, paraphrasing Mark Twain.
The Master
I'm not positive that fixed the problem, but at least it now reads more neutrally.
^^ 'Straw' characters are intentional. That's the entrance criteria. You are thinking of what is, in our slang, Hollywood Feminism.
edited 23rd Sep '10 3:39:48 PM by FastEddie
Goal: Clear, Concise and Witty
Zzzzzzzzzz
^ Probably should be YKTTW'd.
...if you don’t love you’re dead, and if you do, they’ll kill you for it.
You gotta get yourself some marble columns
I'm going to say here what I'm inevitably going to say there: it would have to be patrolled vigilantly because it will be filled with natter and incautious edits shortly after launch — basically the same stuff that used to gunk up Straw Feminist until Fast Eddie (et al) dealt with it.
The child is father to the man —Oedipus
Zzzzzzzzzz
Yes, it will. But having one trope for Feminism used only to be proved wrong and another one for "All feminism is radical, militant, misandrist feminism" should make keeping both of them clean easier in the long run. Both of them will need curators who are willing to be ruthless about removing "not an example".
...if you don’t love you’re dead, and if you do, they’ll kill you for it.
The Master
I think having a Hollywood feminist trope would at least make it more clear what counts as an example, because right now I don't think most of the examples even fit the straw definition. One has to wonder how a real life section ever appeared, since by definition straw is fiction only (unless some higher being is creating idiots to show how stupid their philosophy is).
^^^^^ I don't think any of the other Strawman tropes are described in such a limited way. It's not exactly misleading, but elaboration would definitely help.
"The difference between reality and fiction is that fiction has to make sense." - Tom Clancy, paraphrasing Mark Twain.
You gotta get yourself some marble columns
Known: that's the essential difference between Hollywood X and Straw X. I don't think there's anything else in both variations, though.
The child is father to the man —Oedipus
^ Who's talking about the difference between Hollywood X and Straw X?
"The difference between reality and fiction is that fiction has to make sense." - Tom Clancy, paraphrasing Mark Twain.
They see me troll'n
@Mimimurlough: A Feminist that doesn't constantly rail about how unequal women are in "X" yet cry when men don't act chivalrously. Ever mentions the word "Patriarchy." Or, scoff when I bring up Men's Rights issues.
If people want to have a page about caricatures of Feminism, they probably aught to just make the page Hollywood Feminism. Since a caricature and straw man really are two very different things. And lumping them into the same trope can be taken as bias, especially when the definition has a lot of Natter.
edited 23rd Sep '10 11:57:52 PM by CommandoDude
My other signature is a Gundam.
Bunker: A: I suppose the first one would be the equivalent to men who call themselves feminist, but think that women should solve the problem all by themselves. B: a sad situation, but anti feminists do the man angle so often that people get suspicious. C: that is not what it means! I cannot stress this enough. Whatever the word means on tv or on the mind of the masses, that is not what patriarchy would mean in any serious discussion or for anyone with the slightest education on the subject.
This is a good reason not to have the Hollywood Feminist. Values Dissonance, lack of knowlege or political standpoint is bound to cause a flamewar on how common it is, what counts, and what to think of that sort of behaviour.
From the other point of view, the Real Life section and the Troper Tales secation have been used to complain about feminsm of any kind (even down to the watered down version shown in Jezebel. Yes, really.)
Uh... no. They bitch about crazy radicals.
Half-Life: Dual Nature, a crossover story of reasonably sized proportions.
They also bitch about language analysis, write Solanas and Dworkin out as all out crazy (even some of their ideas aren't all bad) and one nasty case of calling someone a straw feminist for taking offense to a darwinist view of our gender roles. That look OK to you?
The discussion has moved on to a different trope. Marking this one as closed.
Goal: Clear, Concise and Witty
If you've ever bothered to look at the Straw Feminist page with more then a passing glance, you'll find this page has been a constant source of Natter, Edit Wars, and Justifying Edits. Frankly, this is because the trope is biased, not just in the title, but in the content as well. No, that's not just my opinion, a lot of people keep trying to edit the article because people have been upset that the trope implies that "Straw" feminists either don't exist IRL or are a much smaller minority then they are. (YMMV with an emphasis on Understatement) The article assumes that any depiction of criticism of Feminism is a misrepresentation based on Radical Feminism instead of the "Real" movement.
As you can imagine, the trope has been a constant source of Take That!. Between people claiming that "Straw Feminists" are just a 'small radical part of the movement' and those that disagree. Just look at the loooong troper tales page for evidence.
I think renaming the trope would be a good idea, since, honestly the idea that all uses of Feminists are just around to express a writer's dislike of "Feminism" For instance, the Zaku Club of the Ouran High School Host Club is apparently a "Straw Feminist" but they're clearly a parody.
The point is that the trope is so broad and subjective it can just be used to discredit any criticism of the feminist movement as "Writer Bias"
My other signature is a Gundam.