I kinda don't want to head down the road of arguing that Star Wars is sexist, but using the "it was a throwback to when women were treated as sex objects" defense doesn't really help argue against the exploitation angle.
Too Serious?: Sexual Assault in RotJ
- Thread starter Myasishchev
- Start date
I don't see it as so much an arguement as illustrating Lucas' mindset. The fact is he took inspiration from hundreds of sources, and damsels in distress was definitely one of them. If anything he should get credit for having his damsel rescue the boys on more than one occasion. not to mention aggressively negotiating with galactic gangsters to eliminate her boyfriends debt.
I know you mean something else, but from the way I want to read that last line:
I doubt Lucas would have some girl on girl action in 1983, in a fanchise he thought was aimed for kids.
Today, though, might be another story...
Yeah, I'm not trying to take a hard stance on this and I understand what you're saying, but it would have been even cooler if the only heroine in the film hadn't been turned into a scantily-clad dressed slave. It certainly could have been worse, too. I guess I'm saying it's hard to ignore that when Leia, a diplomat and highly intelligent woman and great fighter is turned slave for a scene, she's treated like a sex object. When Ani is a slave, he gets to work in a cool mechanic's garage!
It's not so much that Star Wars was required to be taking great steps forward in gender stereotypes. It's just the topic of this thread shows where it clearly just sat back into the stereotypes like a comfy chair and said, "Well, we've done some great work showing how smart and sophisticated Leia is, now we can take a break and strip her and chain her up."
Edited to add: Since Star Wars was such a huge hit when I was a kid (dressed up as SW characters for five years as a kid for Halloween and I was not alone), the impact is greater than if we were discussing Heartbeeps or something.
Personally I think even chained to a rubber slug Carrie Fisher still maintained far more respect and dignity than say Megan Fox was permited in Transformers just sitting on a motorcycle; And the list can go on. And honestly Leia may have been a little ahead of her time. Before Star Wars Women were still relegated to running and screaming and Ripley would still be another two years away. I guess what I'm trying to say is between the sexist standards that existed before Star Wars and the ones emerging today, in the scheme of things, Leia's gold bikini was simple harmless fun.
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I'm of the female variety, I saw RotJ when I was youngish and never really saw anything 'deep' about Leia's bikini scenes, other than the bog standard "Jabba's a sexist bastard, he wouldn't have done that to Han"
Or maybe he would have...?
In my own bumbling incoherent way, I'd suggest to any man who doesn't see the harm in treating Leia the way she was treated, then put a man in that position (fnarr fnarr) and how do you feel about it now?
going slightly off topic, there's a [dreadful] episode of SGA where a "fat ugly guy" uses the effects of a herb to 'seduce' women - women who wouldn't touch him with a bargepole if he wasn't using this herb (as is mentioned in the episode). I was quite disgusted at the episode and said so online (apparently being the only woman who'd watched the show) and was flamed by the others for being a prude and whatever other slurs they chose to throw.
Really? I'm being a prude because a man is using a drug to make women have sex with him? There's a word for that, isn't there?
And what if Lucius had been gay and used the drug to persuade the men to 'date' him...?
So y'know it all depends on your point of view.
I'm of the female variety, I saw RotJ when I was youngish and never really saw anything 'deep' about Leia's bikini scenes, other than the bog standard "Jabba's a sexist bastard, he wouldn't have done that to Han"
Or maybe he would have...?
In my own bumbling incoherent way, I'd suggest to any man who doesn't see the harm in treating Leia the way she was treated, then put a man in that position (fnarr fnarr) and how do you feel about it now?
going slightly off topic, there's a [dreadful] episode of SGA where a "fat ugly guy" uses the effects of a herb to 'seduce' women - women who wouldn't touch him with a bargepole if he wasn't using this herb (as is mentioned in the episode). I was quite disgusted at the episode and said so online (apparently being the only woman who'd watched the show) and was flamed by the others for being a prude and whatever other slurs they chose to throw.
Really? I'm being a prude because a man is using a drug to make women have sex with him? There's a word for that, isn't there?
And what if Lucius had been gay and used the drug to persuade the men to 'date' him...?
So y'know it all depends on your point of view.
[Dennis]It's Speedo[/Dennis]
Yep. What's fucked up is fantasizing that it was a sexual assault...
btw, http://automaticlifestyledispenser.com/2009/11/30/jar-jar-binks-candy-tongue/ is truly fucked up.
Did the guy get his comeuppance in the episode in question? If yes, then the story has a positive moral slant to it. Why should drama not be able to depict the despicable things that people do in real life such as this analogy for the Rohypnol date-rape drug?
Agreed. I've never found that outfit erotic and I was sixteen when I saw the film in the theatre: rigid plastic doesn't do anything for me.
Neither did I. I think the take in the original post is interesting, but I honestly never thought anything of it beyond "Leia's in trouble" as someone said earlier.
Judged by someone who'a a near contemporary, CF had a hot bod back in the day, but the shrewishness of her demeanour while depicting Leia was a real turn off. I did sort of wonder what Jabba might have gotten up to, but then I remembered - this is a work of fiction.
Well, I don't know what movie they were watching in 1977. My eyes weren't exactly glued to her earmuffs, if you know what I'm sayin'.
Back on topic, my two cents:
Obviously, the context is that Jabba's been a very bad slug, and he deserves what he gets. If there's a problem in portraying Slave Leia too unapologetically, I think it's coming from the light-hearted tone of the whole film, which at every turn overrode the serious themes that were presented. Humor and the light touch even colored the Throne Room sequences, largely in Ian McDiarmid's delivery.
On the other hand, the feeling that everything's gonna be alright that just flowed through that whole movie is an interesting contrast to the tone of TESB. I say interesting because the singularity of that tone (which seems to permeate everything in ROTJ) succinctly tells all we need to know. It makes ROTJ as easily distinguishable from the other two films in the OT in a way not unlike how one can easily distinguish the three movements in a Bach concerto just by listening to a few bars.
From this point of view, the light tone doesn't necessarily bother me. It just means we aren't supposed to take things seriously, and perhaps most important for the audience, we aren't supposed to be frightened anymore. TESB was the time to be scared and frightened. That part's over now.
To me it was more about being baroque and over the top than erotic; up to then all we saw were uniforms of some kind (and utilitarian sets). I'm certain it was influenced by http://www.maddogresin.com/aurapaint.htm
We should try to remember, the Star Wars movies are not trying to be deep profound statements about anything, just harmless entertainment. To that end, Slave Leia is nothing more than eye candy, not a representation of sexual assault or anything of the like. In fact, it was not until reading this thread that the idea of Jabba raping Leia or any of his slave girls even occurred to me.
Perhaps the movie should have also included a scene with Luke or Han in a skimpy outfit just to keep things equal. It didn't, and 28 years after its release is too late to complain about it. And we also don't need to give Lucas anymore ideas on how to change the movies. Besides, an earlier scene in ROTJ did show Leia dragging Chewbacca around on a leash, so it's not like the movie was actively discriminating against her.
Besides, I've seen things on the internet that make Slave Leia look pretty damn tame...
EDIT: Had to correct my mathematical error.
Perhaps the movie should have also included a scene with Luke or Han in a skimpy outfit just to keep things equal. It didn't, and 28 years after its release is too late to complain about it. And we also don't need to give Lucas anymore ideas on how to change the movies. Besides, an earlier scene in ROTJ did show Leia dragging Chewbacca around on a leash, so it's not like the movie was actively discriminating against her.
Besides, I've seen things on the internet that make Slave Leia look pretty damn tame...
EDIT: Had to correct my mathematical error.
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Not with Uncle George's amazing Ultimate, Final-This-Time-I-Promise Next Special Edition CGI makeover!
"I always wanted to put Luke and Han in a skimpy outfit at the time, but the technology just didn't exist back then..."
Maybe Uncle George will decide it's not appropriate for his heroine to kill first, and in the next version Jabba will try and strangle Leia first. Then we'll get a load of internet fanboyz crying out:
"Leia strangled first!!"
Vauban himself could not construct a wall of sterner stuff!
I was being facetious.
Mon Mothma was her pal, right? I got that impression.
At least in the film, Ming was gonna straight-up rape her. That was text text. The other harem chicks explained that maybe she ought to get drunk first because it made it easier. It's a classic adventure situation!
Indeed. Which is why I'm conflicted at most about the film itself.
Well, arguably, she only got out of it alive because Luke showed up. Presumably she'd have had the upper body strength to kill Jabba anyway, but it's only speculative what would have happened next.
I was never a Stargate fan, but, yeah, that sounds pretty messed up.
On the other hand--overlooking the lack of consent involved in the drugging itself--I've always been sort of ambivalent to mind control-style rape. To use a comic book example, there's the Purple Man, who had the power of mind-altering pheromones which basically made anyone (man, woman, child) his slave within a given proximity to him. As you might expect, he used this ability with gusto. But what's interesting is that his victim, Jessica Jones, admits to wanting to do all the things she was forced to do at the time, although she hated that she did later. This was also basically the premise of the Dick novella The Golden Man. ( I'm sure the names are just a coincidence, huh?)
Now I find this interesting because our entire consent regime assumes that we have volition in the first place--an unproven assertion, although a useful one for our social system--and only certain classes of external factors (naked force, intoxication in the absence of prior consent,* fraud of identity, etc) overcome volition, while other external factors (good looks, other types of fraud,** desperation) do not.
So, assume a situation where one actor can manipulate another's emotions at will. While obviously dangerous, while obviously punishable under laws meant for humans, I dunno if it really obviates consent as a philosophical concept.
In any event, if I came up with a drug that made people desire and enjoy sex regardless of their partner's attractiveness or body odor, I wouldn't use it to rape people. I'd get it FDA approved and sell it to married couples. My billions would ensure the consensual sex train kept a'rolling all life long.
*Well, not in Canada, according to recent SCC (iirc) decision that requires ongoing conscious consent at every moment of a sexual encounter. It's the dumbest Goddamned decision I've ever read, insofar as it makes a kiss goodnight on a sleeping spouse's forehead a sexual assault. Or maybe even just snuggling next to them. It's a truly horrible piece of legal reasoning.
**Aaand not in Israel. The usual case of rape by fraud is the perpetrator pretending to be a loved one of the victim, e.g. the rape scene in Revenge of the Nerds (or not; she certainly ratified the sex, but it's a really creepy Goddamn scene). In Israel, there was a rape by fraud conviction for an Arab who claimed only to be a Jew in order to convince a woman to sleep with him. Asshole? Yes. Rapist? No. I'm gonna call this one really bad law too. And racist.
One of us seems to know the definition of sexual assault, and the other doesn't. It might be the one who's a lawyer. But it might not!
So go ahead and try doing what Jabba did and explain to the judge how it doesn't constitute a sexual assault, it's only a regular case of assault and battery and false imprisonment with no sexual overtones whatsoever. Also use this explanation for the dancing girl you fed alive to an animal after engaging in a session of totally non-erotic asphyxiation.
I was being facetious.
Mon Mothma was her pal, right? I got that impression.
At least in the film, Ming was gonna straight-up rape her. That was text text. The other harem chicks explained that maybe she ought to get drunk first because it made it easier. It's a classic adventure situation!
Dream said:
Indeed. Which is why I'm conflicted at most about the film itself.
Well, arguably, she only got out of it alive because Luke showed up. Presumably she'd have had the upper body strength to kill Jabba anyway, but it's only speculative what would have happened next.
I was never a Stargate fan, but, yeah, that sounds pretty messed up.
On the other hand--overlooking the lack of consent involved in the drugging itself--I've always been sort of ambivalent to mind control-style rape. To use a comic book example, there's the Purple Man, who had the power of mind-altering pheromones which basically made anyone (man, woman, child) his slave within a given proximity to him. As you might expect, he used this ability with gusto. But what's interesting is that his victim, Jessica Jones, admits to wanting to do all the things she was forced to do at the time, although she hated that she did later. This was also basically the premise of the Dick novella The Golden Man. ( I'm sure the names are just a coincidence, huh?)
Now I find this interesting because our entire consent regime assumes that we have volition in the first place--an unproven assertion, although a useful one for our social system--and only certain classes of external factors (naked force, intoxication in the absence of prior consent,* fraud of identity, etc) overcome volition, while other external factors (good looks, other types of fraud,** desperation) do not.
So, assume a situation where one actor can manipulate another's emotions at will. While obviously dangerous, while obviously punishable under laws meant for humans, I dunno if it really obviates consent as a philosophical concept.
In any event, if I came up with a drug that made people desire and enjoy sex regardless of their partner's attractiveness or body odor, I wouldn't use it to rape people. I'd get it FDA approved and sell it to married couples. My billions would ensure the consensual sex train kept a'rolling all life long.
*Well, not in Canada, according to recent SCC (iirc) decision that requires ongoing conscious consent at every moment of a sexual encounter. It's the dumbest Goddamned decision I've ever read, insofar as it makes a kiss goodnight on a sleeping spouse's forehead a sexual assault. Or maybe even just snuggling next to them. It's a truly horrible piece of legal reasoning.
**Aaand not in Israel. The usual case of rape by fraud is the perpetrator pretending to be a loved one of the victim, e.g. the rape scene in Revenge of the Nerds (or not; she certainly ratified the sex, but it's a really creepy Goddamn scene). In Israel, there was a rape by fraud conviction for an Arab who claimed only to be a Jew in order to convince a woman to sleep with him. Asshole? Yes. Rapist? No. I'm gonna call this one really bad law too. And racist.
One of us seems to know the definition of sexual assault, and the other doesn't. It might be the one who's a lawyer. But it might not!
So go ahead and try doing what Jabba did and explain to the judge how it doesn't constitute a sexual assault, it's only a regular case of assault and battery and false imprisonment with no sexual overtones whatsoever. Also use this explanation for the dancing girl you fed alive to an animal after engaging in a session of totally non-erotic asphyxiation.
You lost me here. When I saw Princess Leia in the gold bikini at the tender age of nine, my thoughts were not on the vicious sexual assault she must have suffered at the hands of Jabba's guards, but rather on the fact that I just saw Princess Leia's boobies. I was a deep thinker even at that young age. Little did I know I was a potential rapist in training because I still carry a nostalgic torch for the gold bikini.
I'd guess that 99% of the people who find the gold bikini exciting don't even associate it with sexual assault. They associate it with iconic female hero from one of the biggest scifi films of all time in a skimpy bikini.
When I fantasized about Matilda May in Lifeforce, I wasn't really thinking through the implications of being an apocalyptic naked space vampire in London. Jenny Aguttar's outfit didn't make me ponder the injustice of the ageist population control methods in Logan's Run. Sometimes a hot woman in a skimpy outfit is just that.
Which doesn't make your interpretation of the scene wrong (I agree with you about it being a sexual assault if we were dealing with a real life situation), it's just a bit of a leap to assume something potentially sinister about the people who fantasize about it when everyone knows no actual sexual assault happened and the thing the vast majority of people fantasize about is the sexiness of the outfit on Princess Leia/Carrie Fisher, not the context of why she was in the outfit to begin with.
Now, I was just making a little joke at Ross' expense. I'm a Friends fan, you see, and it's funny (well, to me, anyway) to call him a sexual deviant. I don't actually think "Slave Leia is hot" = "I want to rape women."
I think, generally, it's just a salient case of objectification--which itself is a form of decontextualization.
I think, generally, it's just a salient case of objectification--which itself is a form of decontextualization.
Do those pretty words mean it's OK to think bikini-leia is sexy?
Now I'm disappointed.