I sincerely apologize to those who were hurt by my words.
The last thing I want to do is pit members of my community against each other. It’s a cliche but the fact that I didn’t see it coming means I have a lot to learn. What I had to say was beside the point, not to mention a buzzkill on a fun summer movie.
The movie was telling a story about queer AAPI men, whose experiences don’t show up enough in movies or anywhere else. I deleted a tweet that many of you rightly pointed out was offensive. Still thinking about how perfectly the misapplication of the Bechdel test on a gay rom com represents a certain kind of exclusionary, self-serving feminism that misses the larger goal of equity for all.- Frankie Huang 黄碧赤 ? June 7, 2022Īfter being dragged for hours, Rosin put out a statement: It also can serve as a reminder that she is aware of the good faith and bad faith elements of the Discourse™. Jane Austen’s Pride & Prejudice), it passes! While it doesn’t even matter if it passes one pithy line from a comic that was never intended to be used this way, it was really great that Bechdel did this. Because two men are talking about a character in a book by Novel Prize-winning author Alice Munro, and Fire Island is based on one of the most famous novels written by a woman ever (a.k.a. Alison Bechdel joined in to make a special amendment to this test so it could pass. There's a connection between Dianne Feinsteinism and the "Fire Island fails the Bechdel test" take and I'm not going to spell out what it is but if you know you know!!! ???♀️- Rebecca Sun 孫洪美 June 7, 2022ĭespite many philosophies and frameworks that enter public discourse, the creator of the Bechdel-Wallace test ( along with her friend Liz Wallace, who she credits with the idea) is still very much online and active. White feminism has a long history of making arguments about inclusion or visibility only if specifically white women are included-from first-wave feminism and its blatant racism to second-wave feminism and its exclusion of queer women (and racism), to this modern idea that media is not valid unless it passes an arbitrary test.” Medlen expanded upon this when she wrote, “hite feminist film discourse has made it their primary litmus test. To weaponize this “test” against a story of queer men feels especially malicious and disingenuous because the comic was calling out lack of queer media representation.įellow TMS writer D.R.
Many have been quick to point out that the Bechdel-Wallace test is not a marker for a good representation of women in media or what makes a good movie-it did originate as a barb in a comic intended to illustrate how women are treated on movies, not as something intended to be an in-depth, nuanced media critique. These include the Mako Mori Test (2013), The Next Bechdel Test(s) (2017), and The Kent Test (2019). Since then, many others have created their own that continue this conversation, especially in regards to elements of the story and taking the inclusion of all women into account, not just women in general, where white women tend to be the ones who benefit. First appearing in the 1985 queer comic Dykes To Watch Out For, the test simply asks: Are there two or more women, with character names, in a movie? Do they speak with each other? Is this conversation about something other than a man? The test is just an interrogation of the lack of meaningful roles for women and points out that too many movies come with the same point of view-that being cisgender, straight, white, and male, though the “test” only deals with that equation in part.
Do we just ignore the drab lesbian stereotypes bc cute gay Asian boys?” This prompted some understandable backlash, and now even an amendment to the “test” by its creator.īefore even getting into the racial dynamics of that terrible take, let’s do a refresher on what the Bechdel-Wallace test (sometimes just called the Bechdel test) is. In now-deleted tweet, author and critic Hanna Rosin wrote, “So #FireIslandMovie gets an F- on the Bechdel test in a whole new way. If you’re wondering who would see the gay Asian romance movie Fire Island and think it’s appropriate to bash it in the name of the Bechdel-Wallace test, we unfortunately have the answer.