MovieChat Forums > Red Sonja (1985) Discussion > Why 'gender switch' rarely works

Why 'gender switch' rarely works

posted a year ago by avortac4 (3751)
2 replies | jump to latest

Please get me right, it does work sometimes. I get the 'half-naked woman with a sword'-trope, I see it can be very 'cool', it can be very 'exciting' in.. eh.. various ways.

I truly get 'fighting women' or 'warrior women' being fun and interesting to watch on the screen (Hong Kong movies really show this well) and exciting to read about in comics and such.

However, the problem often is that the makers of these things don't really delve too deep into the different psychology of women and men. The 'value' of a man is different from the 'value' of a woman - and I am not objectifying here, just talking about the story-, and entertainment value, etc.

The problem comes from women and men being valued for different things. Women's mating selection is also vastly different from men's.

Conan can mate with weak, vulnerable women - no problem.

Would we expect a female conan to mate with weak, vulnerable men? Absolutely not, it would feel wrong, it would not seem organic. Women always mate 'up', whereas men have no problem mating 'down'.

A billionaire man can easily fall in love with a poor waitress from the wrong side of the tracks.

You almost never see this in reverse - rich, wealthy, powerful women rarely choose poor waiters or any low-, or no-status men.

A woman's power (if you can even define a 'woman' these days) comes from her femininity - motherhood, sexuality, cuteness, bodily shape, youth, fertility and so on. Women have higher level of 'social capability' when it comes to reading facial expressions, tones of voice, body language and so on. Women's 'gossip' is actually a useful thing for a tribe and a family, as they can keep up with what's going on in the community and around them, and thus keep the family/village updated.

Basically, social skills, detail in all kinds of emotional things and 'reading people' are things women are masters (mistresses?) at.

Women can easily also attract and seduce men, just by using the right body language, looking pretty/cute, being demure, shy, using the right looks, the right voice and so on. Men can't do this - to attract a woman, a man needs status in some form (to list some: outlaw biker, alpha, PUA, wealthy/rich, celebrity, charismatic, etc.), and to display that status in an organic way (arriving in a Lamborghini trumps talking about how much money you have in the bank).

These movies/stories rarely use women's feminine powers (which are vast even in the real world) to show how powerful women can be, but they try to make the woman into another man.

The problem is, men don't really have anything other but their status and utility - their physical and mental strength and all that. Conan hacks his way out of problems very often, because it's the only way for him. He can't just look pretty and seduce his captor and then poison their drink the way a woman could.

'Femme fatale' is a very strong, powerful woman, but you rarely see it in these stories.

They just strip the woman half-naked, put a sword into her hand, and tell them to be another Conan. This doesn't work, because you are not utilizing the power the woman naturally and organically has.

People read Conan comics for a very different reason they read Red Sonja. Never underestimate the power of simp boners - they will praise ANY woman in any movie/situation, if she's even remotely cute/pretty (just look at the comments on this board for a below-mediocre movie..)

Sure, it looks cool when you have a pretty woman with good body doing sword stuff in a bikini, but if you are not utilizing a woman's real and natural power, you are only making a woman do 'man stuff', and at the same time, robbing the man of his only value.

Women have multiple levels of power, man only has basically one. If you make women physically stronger than men, just as capable of doing the stuff men do, then what does that leave for men to do? If Red Sonja can be just as good as Conan (sounds like equality, right?), then what's the point of Conan?

There's a reason why women are physically and in some ways mentally weaker than men - it lets men have at least something to do, some kind of use.

A female James Bond would not work any more than a female Conan does - people are always going to look at a woman differently than a man. People expect James Bond to have a masculine power of mental capacity, physical strength, ability to fight and be strong under stressful situations.

A female James Bond would be looked at as something sexually exciting, attractive and so on. A female Bond going around seducing men left and right wouldn't work the same way, because it's an actual achievement for a man to be able to attract pretty women (impossible for most men), but it's ridiculously easy for women to attract all kinds of men without even doing anything but looking pretty.

Also, it would feel shameful, if a woman would sleep with just any man - now the man would have to be some kind of high-status alpha/ruler/etc.

[–] avortac4 (3751) a year ago

The dynamic just wouldn't work.

Sure, you can have your 'Alien' and 'Red Sonja' and all that, and it can work fine in a movie, and all the 'strong women' can look good on screen punching, kicking and hitting other women and also men.

However, it's not woman's real power to be able to kill something with a sword the same way it's a man's real power. It's not a woman's real power to be able to kick buttockses of much bigger men as if it's just a walk in the park.

Something always feels off, when you see a tiny woman just punch their way out of every situation, and you see these large men just fall so easily. It's not the same.

It would be more organic and interesting if men were allowed to be the strong, masculine leader types, and women were the more subtle, maybe socially manipulating types, that can use psychological and even sexual mind games to extract information from men, and read other women and use that to their advantage and so on.

It's such a waste to always see the 'strong woman' trope simply being a 'clone of a man', and then feeling all the weirdness that comes with trying to make a woman into a man. The psychology is so different, it just doesn't work. You can celebrate James Bond for being able to attract some gorgeous beauty, but it's hard to celebrate a woman being able to attract a simp desk clerk.

It just feels weird when a woman does 'man-stuff' too much, and doesn't utilize the IMMENSE sexual-social power she has in the world. If a woman points a finger of accusation, everyone believes her. Men generally want to protect women, especially against men, but not men, especially against women.

Wouldn't it be cool to see a woman protect a man socially the way men are expected to protect women physically? I can only recite ONE example of this, and it was the coolest moment in a TV show ever - the Black (that IS her surname!) woman defends Larry David in the show 'Curb Your Enthusiasm', when Susie tries to slam him verbally - GLORIOUS!

[–] avortac4 (3751) a year ago

So the 'simple gender switch' never really works, because women and men have a very different psychology, physiology, mating strategy and brain functionality.

The world also treats women and men differently - we are always ready to believe a man is a scumbag, but almost never that a woman is.

To me, a character, man or woman (or genderless), is not powerful because they can beat 12 men easily with some magical Aikidoo, but because they can TAKE HITS from men into the face. You almost never see a woman be shot in the head and blood splatter, but you see this a lot for men.

The world wants to protect women, it's ready to believe women and not believe men, and so on.

This could be utilized SO much, as it's a huge part of women's power in real world, so why not in a story/movie as well? Instead, they make the women look like men, so no one is supposed to care about them, and men are always ready to physically FIGHT a woman, when in real world, they would be constantly thinking about how to get in the woman's good side so they might give them.. favors..

All this is never considered in a story, so it comes off as fake, unrealistic and silly. A man would rather sleep with a woman than fight her, especially a pretty one, but in these stories/movies, men are always INSTANTLY ready to just FIGHT her instead. And the woman physically fighting them also seems a waste, when she could just seduce them and then control the situation. Women using fists to solve problems just isn't realistic - not because women can't kick buttockses (they can), but because they have SO MANY BETTER OPTIONS because women have more power than men in the world!

All men have, are their fists/weapons in these situations, but women have a PLETHORA of other options that are actually more powerful.

This is why women fist/sword/weapon-fighting especially men always seems off, it always feels weird, it's always unrealistic and so on. You can't just 'switch' genders.