insistonplot asked:

I just read a story outline from a female classmate where the only female characters are a prostitute and a mother. Neither of them are redeemed and are only made important in relation to the male main character.
Do you think it’s mainly a male mindset that’s responsible for most of these kinds of stories or are both men and women circulating non-important-female-characters?

It’s the culture we live in. The male perspective is valued over the female one. So even women undervalue their own perspective and their own experience and their own entertainment value in their own writing. Which is why it’s important to keep pointing out that it’s going on, even to other women who should supposedly know this already. It’s sneaky, crawling around inside our brains like a Trematode.

Try pointing out to her that her only female characters exist to advance the male character’s plot. She is probably not even aware she’s doing it. Encourage her to find roles for female characters that advance their own plotlines. And it isn’t about sticking in a random scene with a couple women that doesn’t make sense with the rest of the story. Lots of times, there are roles that could go to either a male or female character, and we as a culture have been taught that male is the default. But if you stop and think for a while, maybe some of those default-men could be women. In fact, probably most of them! Which doesn’t mean change them all to women, and it doesn’t mean there won’t be subtle changes in dialogue, but the story can advance just fine, and the same meaning will be there.