There was something really sinister I learned writing Unstoppable Wasp that I didn't with Princeless:
Some people think it is okay to let girls like and do boy things because boy things are better and they think that girl is an exception. They still think girl things are lesser.
Some people think it is okay to let girls like and do boy things because boy things are better and they think that girl is an exception. They still think girl things are lesser.
A recurring complaint when Unstoppable Wasp started that I hadn't anticipated was that the characters (teenage girls) sounded like teenage girls. To me, this was a compliment. I nailed it! That's not how they meant it.
What they meant is that they were supposed to believe these characters were super intelligent, that they were scientists on part with Hank Pym and Bruce Banner, but they could not believe that because they spoke like teenage girls.
What I began to piece together from the critiques and twitter trolls and all that was that it was okay for girls to like science, but not for scientists to be girls. Scientists can be world travelling adventures, spies, and whip wielding supermen - but not teenage girls.
In the minds of some people, a girl doing stuff that they associate with men is a step up some sort of ladder, but a boy doing things associated with girls was a step down. Which, boy, that is a deeply screwed up psychological dragon to slay.
One thing I did to contest this is to encourage artists to push Nadia's fashion the other directions. Nadia loves lace and sparkles and tulle and frills and YES she is smarter than your fave and still loves internet memes - FIGHT ME!
Then came the guy online who got mad about the name G.I.R.L. because it degraded these geniuses. They should be discussed as women. He thought the phrase "girl genius" was akin to a slur. But, I pointed out, they are girls.
While Marvel discourages the assigning of actual ages, they top out around 16 and I imagine most of them being slightly below that. So G.I.R.L. is made up of actual girls and there is nothing demeaning about them being referred to as such.
And then I felt like I had a revelation. This guy hates girls. These guys hate girls. It is okay for a young woman to like science, but they have to not be a girl anymore, because they literally feel like being a girl is a status of being less than.
And that's why this mom won't buy a pink comic with girls on the front for her son, because she thinks it's a step down for him. He's moving away from the light and to something worse. God, we have to do better.
Because we can tell our girls they can do anything all day long, but until we actually mean that, it's not going to be true. We're still keeping our boys from enjoying things that are fun and feminine because we think it makes them weaker and it doesn't. It makes them whole.
And unless our girls suddenly find themselves in a world without those boys, it won't matter that they think they can do anything, because all those boys see is a girl and they've been taught that girls and girly things deserve their scorn.
Anyway, if you want to read the Unstoppable Wasp, the first volume is VERY on sale at Amazon right now, so check it out: amazon.com/Unstoppable-Wa…
