#tw sterilization
Criticizing Joss Whedon’s problematic writing choices does not translate to hate.
Also, word of advice, if you want people to stop accusing you of being racist or sexist, then you might want to stay away from the following:
- Having the lead female protagonist of your show almost raped by her love interest and then have the showrunner praise the rapist as being his favorite character and having the best character development (Spike, Buffy the Vampire Slayer)
- Plan to have a prostitute gang raped to feed into the character development of her male love interest (Inara, Firefly)
- Have a show that heavily features Asian culture and religions, but then fail to cast any Asian actors (Firefly)
- Claim that having Asian actors was unnecessary because one of your white actors “kind of looked Asian.” (Summer Glau, Firefly)
- Fire your lead actress for getting pregnant and then spend the next season shitting all over her character (Charisma Carpenter, Angel)
- Inviting that lead actress to come back to the show, promising her that she’ll stick around until the final episode, only to turn around and kill her character off at the last moment as revenge (Charisma Carpenter, Angel)
- Creating the single most racist depiction of a black female character by making her violent, savage, animalistic and so dumb that she isn’t even able to speak, and then reveal that the way she became the first slayer, was by having a group of old men force a demon into her body without her consent (The First Slayer, Buffy the Vampire Slayer)
- Have one of the most popular female superheroes referred to as a “cunt” by the main villain (Natasha Romanoff, Avengers)
- Claim that because a female character was unable to have children, that she was considered a monster (Natasha Romanoff, Avengers: Age of Ultron)
- Taking one of the strongest female superheroes in the MCU and turning her into an outlet for her male love interest to pour his man angst all over and then completely dump her in the end without any expression of gratitude for all she did for him (Natasha Romanoff, Avengers: Age of Ultron)
- Have one of the most popular superheroes in the MCU joke about raping women (Tony Stark, Avengers: Age of Ultron)
- Feature two characters who were originally of Jewish-Romani descent and then have them whitewashed by hiring white actors to play them (Wanda Maximoff and Pietro Maximoff, Avengers: Age of Ultron)
- Having two Jewish-Romani characters volunteer for a Nazi organization, despite the fact that Jewish and Romani people were victims of the Holocaust (Wanda Maximoff and Pietro Maximoff, Avengers: Age of Ultron)
- Have the audacity to redefine feminism and re-brand it because he found feminism distasteful.
- Constantly using the “break the cutie” trope to punish his supposedly “strong female characters.” (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Firefly, Avengers: Age of Ultron)
- Using the threat of sexual violence against his lead female protagonists on multiple occasions (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Firefly, Avengers)
Check yourself, fandom. These criticisms of Joss Whedon’s work have been long-standing and are completely valid. So, before you get on your high horse and try to accuse his detractors of being bitter fangirls, take a look at all the fucked up shit your problematic fav has said and done, and then we’ll talk.
Suddenly relevant again, because Joss Whedon expressed interest in directing a woman-led MCU superhero film.
And, no, he’s not getting better:
At present, Whedon’s full focus is writing an original screenplay about “a girl who goes through some unbelievable shit.”
He was okay when we didn’t know better. Now we do, and clearly he hasn’t learned.
This is a problem.Let’s clear something here. Natasha was calling herself a monster BECAUSE she chose to be sterile. She chose to go through the process of not baring children. Once she saw Clint and his family. She regretted ever making that decision
That’s entirely not true. From the transcript
(During Natasha’s nightmare)
Madame B: Sloppy. Pretending to fail. The ceremony is necessary for you to take your place in the world.
Natasha Romanoff: I have no place in the world.
Madame B: Exactly.(At the farmhouse)
Natasha Romanoff: Neither can I. In the Red Room, where I was trained, where I was raised, um, they have a graduation ceremony. They sterilize you. It’s efficient. One less thing to worry about. The one thing that might matter more than a mission. It makes everything easier. Even killing. [she hesitates a moment] You still think you’re the only monster on the team?
//
The sterilization was FORCED on her, and she explicitly states that they did it to eliminate distractions and encourage ruthlessness.
