I was saddened to see Melissa McEwan at Shakesville casting a disapproving eye at a recent film (The End Of Love) highlighting the struggles of a single dad. I don’t know anything about the film other than what I can glean from Melissa’s review [ETA: and watching the trailer]1, but it appears to be an intelligent and nuanced look at the growing phenomenon of male single parenting. It’s apparently strong enough to have won some favorable critical responses.
For Melissa, however, it’s a “story that’s already been told” and yet another example of “privileged” men getting “cookies” for doing things that women have done for years. Blinded by her own female privilege, she appears to assume that male privilege extends to all men and exists in all arenas, and doesn’t seem to grasp that there can be strong adverse consequences for (cisgendered, heterosexual) men when they defy gender stereotypes, and that the existence of positive portrayals of such men are a boon to real life men and boys who are looking for role models that go beyond power struggles and male dominance displays. After all, such narratives might help counter the ‘men around children are potential pedophiles’ presumption, something women are largely privileged to be exempt from.
Melissa’s logic would seem to suggest we should turn up our noses at stories of female heroism, since, after all, men have been doing heroic things for years. Indeed, there seems to more than a little whiff of ‘patriarchal feminism’ to Melissa’s reaction here. After all, I don’t recall her turning up her nose at Robert Downey Jr.’s portrayal of Iron Man as a “story that’s already been told.” (Her Her website’s2 review of that film suggested it was passably entertaining, with nary a word about the perpetuation of the gender stereotype that men have to be totally alpha — strong, extraordinarily rich, brilliant, life-risking, noble, and extremely handsome — to be deemed worthy of an attractive and intelligent woman.)
As a gender progressive, I think we should respond to the stories of people who challenge gender preconceptions with applause, not mean-spirited disparagement.3 Has the distribution of “cookies” suddenly become a zero-sum game?
This comment thread is the “No Hostility” thread. Please read this and this for the ground rules. The “Regular Parallel” thread can be found here.
- 2013/1/27[↩]
- Corrected 2013/1/27. I should note that I recall Melissa making various positive comments about the Iron Man movie franchise (though I’m not claiming her assessments were exclusively positive). These comments may have been in discussion threads or different posts. My bad for not being a little more careful when I grabbed the first link that seemed to illustrate my point. [↩]
- Unless of course the execution of those stories sucks.[↩]
Yeah, color me shocked that Mellisa would chid such a movie like that with her usual gynocentric crap of “White Privledged Men don’t have any problems. Herp Derp!”
The commentary section there…digusting pieces of filth as well.
Seriously, Ballgame, I prefer not to listen to the Mellisa McEwans, Hugo
Schwartzers[Schwyzers —ballgame], and Amanda Marcottes of the world. They’re toxic individuals with not a shred of empathy and compassion, out to score political points and bleat on about how men are at fault for everything.Isn’t it funny that she can’t see past the “White Privledged Male” trope and that’s what lead her to the negative review? I swear, it’s like kryptonite to her common sense and rational thought (in her mind).
[Reminder: criticisms should focus on what a person says or does, not who (or what) the 'are'. We encourage commenters to focus on specifics and not make wholesale dismissals based on assumptions about they think or feel. —ballgame]
Just to respond to this:
Ballgame: “Blinded by her own female privilege, she appears to assume that male privilege extends to all men and exists in all arenas, and doesn’t seem to grasp that there can be strong adverse consequences for (cisgendered, heterosexual) men when they defy gender stereotypes, and that the existence of positive portrayals of such men are a boon to real life men and boys who are looking for role models that go beyond power struggles and male dominance displays.”
She doesn’t care either way, Ballgame.
I just hope you aren’t surprised by this ballgame.
In other news Laserdiscs don’t work in DVD players…..
So it’s okay to crap on any movies about women doing things that men have already been doing, too? Not just “heroic” stuff, but success in business (WORKING GIRL), being murdering outlaws (THELMA AND LOUISE), etc.?
No, of course not. Individual creators get to tell their stories and audiences respond to them however they respond to them. This meta-level criticism of “how dare they tell THAT story instead of the one I want them to tell” is always political, nasty, and unfortunate. Every special interest group does it, and it’s pretty much always unfair. The Iraqis were upset that Persians were the villain in 300…well, history puts them there opposite the greeks. Similar complaints about any big movie with villains who aren’t white males (and nazis to be triple safe).
It’s more fair to complain about stereotypes, as they tend to be boring and representative of weak writing. Telling the story of a single male parent is indeed a fresh take in part because of the gender element, which is not the same as when it’s a single female parent. Telling that story again would perhaps be worthy of criticism if it provided nothing new or interesting.
Let me plug/dis another movie, A MARTIAN CHILD, about a single male adopting a troubled kid. Pretty good movie, but open to criticism for changing the man from homosexual to heterosexual as it was in the original award-winning story the movie was based upon. More interesting not to change that element, but I’m sure there were concerns it would hurt the box office.
McEwan really comes across horribly here, in my opinion.
Color me unsurprised. If I recall correctly I seem to remember that ballgame has criticized McEwan one or two times before for being negative towards positive stories about wannabe dads and dads. Let me see what a quick search turns up:
http://www.feministcritics.org.....ticle-noh/
http://www.feministcritics.org.....80%99-noh/
To me this seems to be a pattern.
Just to provide some balance, the other side of the coin, here is a well-deserved criticism of a article about SAHDs: http://www.daddydoctrines.com/.....ewreckers/
I was disappointed in her review too. If the movie was about the problems facing a single mother, does anybody think she’d in essence say that the problems aren’t valid, or at least not worth talking about because the mother is white and able-bodied ?
If you want to talk about one specific problem, it makes sense to leave other problems out of it. Yes, it’s true, it’s possible to have more problems. The only movies worth making are about black, disabled, single, homosexual, glasses-wearing, poor, uneducated, overweight, abused, mothers.
He’s white, and able-bodied. Thus nothing his story tells us about the challenges of being a single father could be worth talking about.
She doesn’t like stories about single dads. It seems to me her beef isn’t with this specific story (she says nothing about it), but with the fact that they’re mentioned at all. The problems of single parenthood are supposed to be owned 100% by females.
All: I’m not at all surprised by Melissa’s post; it is, indeed, consistent with other things she’s written, sadly enough.
Eagle3x:
That’s certainly understandable. Of course, listening to and responding to the MMs, HSs, and AMs of the world is kind of our raison d’etre here at FC.
Mike: I have mixed feelings about what you’re saying. I certainly think there are instances where ‘don’t talk about THAT talk about THIS’ critiques are unfair (as here). If the existing movie focuses on a relatively under-served segment of the market (such as single fathers), I don’t think it’s fair to say a different movie focusing on an even more under-served part of the market should have been made.
OTOH, I don’t have a problem with critics that say that, instead of yet another superhero blockbuster, we should have a dozen smaller pictures, each of which might possibly have a 50-50 shot of being more edifying or focusing on stories (and people) that would otherwise be neglected.
I’m not saying that the excessive investment in the superhero/blockbuster is anything other than the operation of market forces, BTW, just that I don’t have any a priori objection to critics railing against these forces, even if such critiques have ’tilting against windmills’ subtext to them.
Tamen: Interesting SAHD article link; thanks.
Gunnar: I tend to agree.
“She doesn’t like stories about single dads.”
She is not alone. Single dads disrupt a whole range of comfortable narratives – the deadbeat dad, absent fathers, sainted single mothers, the Strong Independent Woman (who doesn’t need a man for anything) – it thretens a whole worldview. Expect resistance.
“She doesn’t care either way, Ballgame.”
Eagle, she cares deeply. Why would she go to out her way like this unless she cared. This looks like caring – in a negative way. This looks a lot like active malice. That expalins this behavior best.
The title of this post is seriously messed up.
It suggests that you think you’re entitled to a woman feeling “hot” about a show about a single dad.
Wow.
Newflash, we don’t all have to like the same toys. It will be okay.
fannie:
The title of my post is completely accurate … I doubt if even Melissa McEwan would disagree with it. (OK, she’d probably take issue with the word, “gynocentric,” but that’s not the issue at hand.)
The notion that this headline suggests I feel “entitled” to anything is strictly a product of your imagination.
I am getting a strong deja-vu feeling here. First my comment on this thread turned out to be pretty close to the comment I left here (I feel old when I accidently discover that I’ve been repeating myself): http://www.feministcritics.org.....ent-257236
And fannie turned up there as well with a comment similar to the comment she left at the same thread: http://www.feministcritics.org.....ent-257361
If history repeats itself we won’t hear anything else from fannie on this thread as well.
Tamen, I was somewhat surprised to find that fannie has referenced us a number of times at her blog since we actually engaged in discussion with her and at her blog last summer (although, admittedly, her references were not particularly flattering). Her popping in here today is also surprising to me. You may be right about her not coming back, but if she’s up for a substantive discussion our door is always open.
hahahahaha,
kind of ironic that when I scanned through the OG article, she hadn’t even watched the movie nor have you…
Well, I watched zero dark 30, maybe I’ll write a long article about that, looks like that’s where the bar is set to be an expert these days
on another note, I remember Metallica covered “Turn the Page.”
the song is about the burnout of musicians on the road…
the video featured a stripper who was touring around and was called sexist by some…
irony of all ironies, it was directed by a guy who says he’ a single father….
http://www.mtv.com/news/articl.....ctor.jhtml
maybe some feminist’s should throw him some cookies
here’s the video…
My focus was on Melissa’s derogatory dismissal of the movie’s underlying concept, SWAB, so I don’t think my not having seen a film affects my reaction significantly. If Melissa had criticized the movie based on its artistic merits (poor acting, bad writing, whatever), I’d have had no objection (unless of course I had seen the movie and thought her evaluation was wrong). But you don’t have to have seen the film to realize there’s something amiss with a critic who sniffs a movie about single dads because it gives “privileged” men too many “cookies.”
Iron Man?
The film about an alpha male who finds his life of drink, money, and women unfulfilling once he decides to actually care about and help other people? The guy so lonely he had to build himself a talking house so he’d have someone to talk to on close to his own level? Or the sequel, where he struggles with his own mortality and revealing his failing health, and heads into a self-destructive spiral, as well as his own unresolved issues with his remote father? Or the upcoming third movie, where he has PTSD?
Maybe Mels just likes Tony’s sexy, sexy goatee.
here’s the trailer…
Ballgame, just curious what you thought of the Metallica video, the reason I putt that was because in contrast it was a man’s depiction of a single mother. Would they call that “mansplainin’”?
I also understand their critique is because it is “supposed” to not be difficult for someone percieved to be high on the privilege hierarchy. Maybe it’s not inconsistent for an over the top superhero guy like Iron Man because he still fits into the “privilege” narrative–he’s a billionaire right? and all his problems he overcomes…. FTR, as they say, I haven’t seen the Ironman movies, I had seen The Avengers that he was also in
Well, I’m not sure “trend” is the right word, but there are certainly people who don’t put men’s biological links to their children on the same footing as women’s, SWAB. But, TBH, I wasn’t really trying to make a broader point, other than that those of us who see ourselves as progressives shouldn’t belittle the challenges that some of us face in dealing with gender stereotypes.
[ETA: This was in response to a comment that stonerwithaboner subsequently re-worded. —ballgame]
@ballgame, I come at this with my own bias as a writer, which I do recognize. When I decide to write a short story or a novel, *I* am the creator and I’m writing it first and foremost for myself. Sometimes the muses dictate a lot of the story, and only much more rarely will I (or many other writers) make conscious choices like, “Oh no, that character needs to be X so I can make a political statement about Y.” Most things like that stand out as polemic and generally make for telegraphed propaganda rather than good, authentic storytelling. But in general I have scorn for critics trying to tell writers what stories they should be telling or not telling — if they care so much, they should start writing themselves! And the painful way it works in the real world is that writers create the stories they need to create and the market decides which ones it wants to see, in the quantities it wants to see. That process selects how many romantic comedies, how many superhero blockbusters, and how many small character studies. There are writers interested in doing all these, and there are audiences in different numbers for all these, and it’s wrong to criticize an individual story or movie for being what it is. And I don’t see the point of criticizing the popularity of things you don’t like yourself — it’s basically a criticism of the rest of the world for not sharing your own preferences, which is just self-involved ego stroking (and windmill tilting as you indicate). I might complain to my friends that I’ve had enough ridiculous vampire movies, but to complain about someone making another vampire story, with all their heart and passion and best intentions (that’s also going to make a lot of money), especially without watching it, is just misguided whining. If a lot of people want to see the next vampire movie, and it makes them happy, there’s nothing wrong with it. In fact, it might just be the best vampire movie every made and quite worth watching.
So I have that bias here, in addition to disliking McEwan’s hypocritical and gender-biased reasoning.
The fact is that few stories have original premises. They’re all stories of characters with problems struggling to deal with them in different ways. Anything fresh and interesting brought to the table is worthwhile, but even old tropes can be well done and worth a look. You can make a good movie that feels fresh about a single mother, or a bad one. You can do the same for a movie about a single father. The concept is often not correlated to the success of the storytelling. I remember being skeptical about a facebook movie, but it was great and it all depended on the execution.
There is a larger political issue that is appropriate to comment on as you have done, ballgame:
This is a great point, in conjunction with your OP, because McEwan’s criticism is of the very concept. To get back into the gender biases, there are not that many single fathers portrayed in the movies and few good role models for men to see. Women have been privileged to have a lot of positive portrayals of working single mothers finding success through their challenges. Men, not so much. Male, in this instance, is not the privileged gender. Someone who sees privilege as unidirectional cannot easily grasp that, unfortunately. You can, and should be appropriately critical when gynocentric feminists miss the point. They need the help!
I have been directly involved in promoting women in science in various ways, and part of the problem is a lack of positive role models. Men of course have had problems taking on new roles themselves (e.g. in traditional female roles like stay-at-home parent, ballet dancer, nurse, etc.). One of the things that needs to keep happening for both sexes is to see men and women succeeding in non-traditional roles, in real life and in our entertainment. It’s really horrible to see someone pushing a genderized preference on this that suggests we shouldn’t be seeing positive portrayals of men in traditionally female roles.
Ok, tldr, I know… In the meantime, I’m going to keep writing the stories I want to tell, the way every other writer is going to do (and there are a million of them telling every kind of story you can imagine), and the critics are advised to target the market/distributors rather than the creators. Personally I’ll be happy for every high-quality, interesting story that reaches a wide audience whether it’s about a man, a woman, or even a vampire.
Just a brief follow-up on some nice lists of movies with single dads being portrayed positively:
http://www.womansday.com/life/.....dads-77471
http://www.examiner.com/articl.....ingle-dads
When I started thinking about it, there are actually quite a lot of these out there, many of which are excellent and moving. There’s a huge number if you start to consider stories in which the main point is not only focused on being a single dad (e.g. Forrest Gump, To Kill a Mockingbird, Outside Providence…and Elektra to get in a superhero movie!).
I don’t agree with all your points, Mike, but great comments.
The lists are interesting. A lot of the entries aren’t really ‘about’ single fatherhood so much as they’re about something else, but happen to have a single father included. I suppose even an inclusion of the single father angle in such a movie at least helps normalize the phenomenon a little bit. I could almost envision a rating scale: 10 points if the movie’s primary focus is a realistic portrayal of a single dad raising a child, down to 1 point if the movie just portrays a significant secondary character as a single father. I haven’t seen Finding Nemo, but my gut reaction would be that an animated movie like that wouldn’t merit too many points.
Just thought of another one that would merit being added to the list: Kramer vs. Kramer.
Kramer vs. Kramer was a really innovative film when it was made, highlighting the divorce phenomenon of the 1970s and the changing dynamic between men, women, and their children. The father suddenly having to take care of the kid and not having a clue was really powerful from several perspectives and very revealing of character.
Finding Nemo was not so realistic or innovative on parenting issues, no.
After reading this interview about The End of Love:
http://news.moviefone.com/2012.....36714.html
it does indeed sound like creative people trying to do something innovative, and not quite like anything I’ve seen before in several respects. I want to see it.
Ballgame: “That’s certainly understandable. Of course, listening to and responding to the MMs, HSs, and AMs of the world is kind of our raison d’etre here at FC.”
And that’s understandable too. However, I just find it futile personally. Not to mention more than a little triggering (I was almost seething with rage reading that commentary section and I had to stop quickly for the sake of my mental health).
To me, people like them propagate the invisibility of survivors like me with their gynocentic opinions. I’d rather stick my head in a broiling oven than endure it.
[...] at “Feminist Critics,” Ballgame is unimpressed by Melissa’s unimpressed-ness. He praises The End of a Love [...]
Many many many years ago there was some after school style movie (only it wasn’t after school it was in the early evening). It was about a single father who had to deal with a lot of sexism, including nowhere for him to change his baby’s diaper. He had to go into the ladies room to use those pull down changing table areas. He got in trouble with the police or something and he went on a campaign to get the changing areas in men’s rooms too. This is literally over 30 years ago and I could never find this movie anywhere on the internet, or it’s title, or it’s even existence. Anyone know or remember this?
BG said, “As a gender progressive, I think we should respond to the stories of people who challenge gender preconceptions with applause, not mean-spirited disparagement. Has the distribution of “cookies” suddenly become a zero-sum game?”
I don’t want anyone’s cookies or applause for being a parent…probably in the same manner a woman doesn’t want cookies or applause for getting a job or changing a tire on their car. It’s condescending.
Also note how you are setting up a false dichotomy. Either it’s cookie and applause or mean-spirited disparagement. How about a mere acceptance of reality?
debaser71, you appear to me to be mixing up two things: reactions to the stories we tell ourselves culturally, and reactions to the lived reality. When gender-bending people appear in popular culture — whether fictional, like Will and Grace, or real, like Ellen Degeneres — I think they have a tremendous positive impact on culture at large in helping actual people living non-traditional lives be accepted instead of reviled. It’s those pop culture appearances that I think should be applauded … I’m not suggesting we should all clap when we see two men kissing on the street.
I hope some people remember the movie you’re thinking of, though. I’m not familiar with it.
In my mind Ellen (and Matthew Shepard) is what kicked off the gay movement. I saw this all happen in real time. So yeah I get that part of what you are saying. With that said, however, the idea of a single father is (or at least was) quite common in the media and such. Maybe not these days (and I wouldn’t know because I don’t watch much TV) but when I was a kid there were a ton of single dads on TV. Diffren’t Strokes, Hello Larry, Benson, even old black and white shows, cowboy shows, St. Elsewhere, etc etc…even Archie Bunker was a single dad. Then that show with Joey Lawrence and Nell…the cop was a single dad. And maybe even his other show Blossom I think the dad was single (Patrick Duffy). Valerie’s Family had the mom die and the dad became a single parent (became the Hogan Family). (And yes, some of these shows had “stand in” mothers, like house keepers).
These days it seems like the dads are just buffoons where the kids and wife poke fun of his missteps. That and there’s a lot of gayness on TV now. And there’s a heck of a lot of raunch.
Then there’s kids TV shows and entire channels for kids on TV. There are a couple of shows where there are also single dads. Hannah Montana (Disney), iCarly (Nick) are just two I can think of right now.
Are there any current adult TV shows that have single dads (and one that isn’t the butt of the jokes)?
Yes I am rambling. Carry on.
“In my mind Ellen (and Matthew Shepard) is what kicked off the gay movement. I saw this all happen in real time”
Ellena dn Matthew Shepard kicked off the gay movement? Debaser, debaser, debaser – you young pup. Stonewall kicked off the gay movement in ’69 and what really lit a fire under it’s ass was the AIDS epidemic.
But I get what you are saying. Youa re talking about mainstram accpetance, not just of gay people in general but of gy issues as serious. Probably not many straight peole ever thought about gay bashing as any real kind of problem unitl Matthew Shepard. “Propaganda” is Latin for “propagation” – infomration accomplishes nothing unless you propagate it.
And there is another kind of propagation besides th media, as important as that is. We were involved in this this afternonn, the (new0 husband and I. We had to redo my life insurance and that crap, so some guy and we were doing this over the phone just now. And so this starnger in Minneapolis was setting up life insurance options for a gay couple – who knows what his religious or political views on gay marrige or gay couples or gay people in general are, and who cares – it’s business. And I realized this si what gay people have been doing for about 20 or 30 years now, just by coming out of the closet and getting straight peopl to interact with us in business settings. We and our relationships have basically become very mundane and unremarkable. That, gentelmen, is the revolution.
And the same thing is coming for single fathers and SAHDs. The oppostion is even easier to rout.
[...] being tolerated when they come from women but swiftly punished when a man even hints at them? Worried at the prospect of your young children being taken from you, and turned against you, by a woman who wants to rape your [...]
[...] being tolerated when they come from women but swiftly punished when a man even hints at them? Worried at the prospect of your young children being taken from you, and turned against you, by a woman who wants to rape your [...]
[…] She is referring to this recent Today article which discusses how more men are cooking the turkey for (American) Thanksgiving, and often doing so with a prototypically masculine spin (i.e. deep frying it or grilling it). Sadly, this dismissive attitude towards the portrayal of men challenging gender stereotypes isn’t a new tack for one of the more popular feminists on the web … in fact, it’s par for the course for Melissa and Shakesville. […]
[…] being tolerated when they come from women but swiftly punished when a man even hints at them? Worried at the prospect of your young children being taken from you, and turned against you, by a woman who wants to rape your […]