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Way back in 2015, when The Force Awakens came out, the misogynistic Internet trolls were also awoken to complain about female lead Rey and cry “Mary Sue.” Things really went to sh-t after The Last Jedi was released in 2017. The sexism and racism got so bad that Kelly Marie Tran (Rose Tico) left social media due to all of the harassment she received. Since then, women, minorities, and allies within the Star Wars community have been playing defense. Whenever a new character is introduced that isn’t a white male, droid, or Yoda species, there’s always a vocal minority of keyboard warriors that find a reason not to like them. For example, from the very first episode of Obi Wan Kenobi, they had problems with Reva, a female Black inquisitor, saying she was “miscast” and “boring.” Though strangely enough, they all loved Gina Carano’s generic character in The Mandalorian, go figure.
Well, last week, the topic of females within supposedly male-dominated fandoms came up yet again. Star Wars YouTuber Niatoos Dadbeh brought psychologist Sadia Khan on as a guest, and they started talking about Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, who will become the first female Star Wars director. Obaid-Chinoy recently made some whiny fanboys mad when she said, “It’s about time that we had a woman come forward to shape a story in a galaxy far, far away.” Why? Because waaahh why does she have to mention women? Why can’t she just be focused on telling a good story, waahhhh. Anyway, Khan, *who has never even seen any of the franchise,* claimed that women don’t care about Star Wars because “It’s a man’s little thing. Let them have it. But they want to be like, ‘Oh, there’s such a deprivation. We’ve got to be in it,’ so they can be a mini-hero.” Like…what? As a result, women have taken to TikTok to express just how much they love the franchise despite being underrepresented in science fiction in general.
“I personally have lost count of the amount of times I’ve been mansplained, gatekept or belittled as a woman in this fandom,” said Sidney Newcomb, 27. “And every single ‘Star Wars’ woman that I know has experienced the same thing to some degree. And at this point, we’re fed up with it.”
Drea Letamendi, a media psychologist and lifelong “Star Wars” fan, said women have historically been underrepresented in science-fiction, despite being a significant portion of science-fiction consumers.
“‘Star Wars’ is a fixture of our popular culture, and an impressive, very successful franchise,” Letamendi said. “So it almost seems nonsensical for anyone to say that any particular group wouldn’t authentically care about this narrative or the storytelling.”
Although it is more socially acceptable for women to be fans of science-fiction, fantasy and other genres once considered “nerdy,” women in these fandoms still find the validity of their affinity for things like “Star Wars” questioned.
“I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been put on the spot with pop quizzes from men mostly, like trying to prove my knowledge on random, obscure facts in the fandom,” said Tracie Megumi, a cosplayer and lifelong “Star Wars” fan. “And I couldn’t help but think, what if I had heard [Khan’s quote] when I was younger?”
The recent conversation around sexism comes as “Star Wars” continues to highlight many of its female characters — Jedi Knight Ahsoka Tano, for example, has a Disney+ spinoff. Female fans who spoke with NBC News said the solidarity and community they have built has helped them persist even in the wake of comments like Khan’s.
“Even with that misogyny and negativity, there are so many ‘Star Wars’ sisters who are there to lift you up and to defend you and just to celebrate you,” said Hannah Dove, 23, a cosplayer who predominantly dresses as Ahsoka. Seeing so many women push back against misconceptions about women within the fandom has also served as inspiration to continue being public about their love of “Star Wars.”
“I get so worried about people coming for me and saying mean things and whatever, but knowing that I have other females that feel the same way and that are on the same side makes it easier,” said Taya Miller, 24. “So I guess I’m just really grateful for the other women in the community.”
I have gone to San Diego Comic-Con every non-pandemic year since 2007. I have also been involved in different nerdy fan communities over the years. Women have always been here, even if we were unrepresented or felt unwelcome in certain male-dominated spaces. We’re here and we know things. SDCC has been pretty evenly split demographically for a while, despite the fact that panels tend to be male-heavy. Just because we don’t feel the need to go on Reddit and complain about every little thing, it doesn’t mean we’re not active fans with opinions of our own. No one had any issues with Ahsoka the cartoon character until women got super excited to see female representation headline a live-action series.
The whiny fanboys need to chill the F out. This is our space, too. Deal with it. In life, not everything is going to be for you or apply specifically to you, but that doesn’t mean it’s not made for you to enjoy as well. While you’re throwing your little tantrum, you may end up missing out on something really neat and worth paying attention to. There’s no need to go crying “woke” when there’s diverse lead characters in film, TV, and books. It just means it’s inclusive, and if sharing Star Wars with a – gasp! – girl makes you mad, then you really need to reevaluate your priorities.
@_hannahdove_ “Women don’t even watch Star Wars!” *LOUD INCORRECT BUZZER NOISE* (But seriously this sound is so sad and stupid because Star Wars is for everyone) #ahsokatano #starwars #ahsokacosplay #fyp #starwarsgirl #womenofstarwars #starwarsfangirl #starwarscosplay #ahsoka #galaxysedge #starwarstheclonewars #tcw #clonewars #jedi #fangirl ♬ TY FOR 170k LIKES – eowyn ☆
@rebel_rae_cosplay ✨Yes We Do✨ #starwars #womeninstarwars #starwarswomen #starwarscosplay ♬ TY FOR 170k LIKES – eowyn ☆
We #WomenInStarWars have always been here! And, we always will be. #StarWars is for everyone. I've loved Star Wars for 4 decades and a cosplayer for the past 10 years. I've been interviewed about my fandom on TV news, radio & print. This Rebel Princess is a #StarWarsFanForLife! pic.twitter.com/062QlmikYu
— 🔶️ Rebel Princess 🔶️ Jedi Kristen (@SWRebelPrincess) January 21, 2024
A LOT of these fandoms are extremely toxic towards anyone who isn’t male and lets be honest the content creators pander to them. As much as I love The Mandolorian, I’d love to see a Bo Katan spin off. We got Ashoka but there needs to be more. Also, what happening with the Lando spin off – Donald Glover was perfection in that role.
They are more than just toxic, they are hate-filled incels who really worry me (common denominator among terrorists and mass shooters is a hatred of women). They hate women so much, that there is actual backlash against the new Godzilla movie coming out in March because one of the kaiju creatures is rumored to be female. They cannot even stand to have a fictional kaiju be female without ranting about it. It is truly scary.
Bravo to the women who maintain active ties to online fan communities. The few I’ve been a part of were so misogynistic I had to leave. Weekly discussions on how they hate a prominent woman character. Only like the women characters who act like men. Complain about vocal fry and women’s voices sounding annoying. Over and over but each man will wax on and on about it like the first person whose ever had that opinion.
I love Sci -fi but this is why I will always and forever prefer Star Trek to Star Wars who openly embraced people of color from the BEGINNING and interesting storylines for their female characters
Life-long Trekkie and I must say the hate is not as bad on that side than Star Wars. I’m not sure why. I think Roddenberry did a good job early on establishing women in charge with Number One, having Uhura on the bridge and or course several interracial and interspecies relationships. It laid the groundwork for Star Wars but they waited too long in the franchise to really bring it on. Star Trek has been very inclusive for years, which was always Roddenberry’s wish but Star Wars was too vanilla and male for too long.
The fandoms are horrible but it seems a very recent issue too? When the Internet didn’t exist, my mum and I used to have long chats about Star Wars, my father and brother were never interested in the films anyway!
Plus, Rey was already a main character in the Force Awakens and one of the issues was Daisy Ridley’s wooden acting, rather than the character itself.
To Rosie: it’s Gina Carano, not Carrino.
ETA: this comment was supposed to be under Digital Unicorn’s one, sorry!!
ITA about Daisy’s wooden acting – it didn’t get much better in the other 2. I cringe so hard at the kiss with Adam Driver – she was awkward AF. That whole sub plot was so cringe – Driver at least tried to sell it but Ridley was just… She had better chemistry with John Boyega.
Honestly, I really didn’t like The Rise of Skywalker and the Rey/Kylo stuff was primarily why. It’s the only Star Wars movie in the entire franchise that I haven’t watched more than the one time in the theaters.
@AlpineWitch, Oops, thank you for catching that! I’ll fix it!
John Boyega had chemistry with everyone in the sequels! He’s so great.
Don’t get me started on ‘Reylo’, that was a ridiculous plot and they shouldn’t have included it at all!
I agree with anyone who said “more John Boyega”, the films did his character dirty, really… such a wasted opportunity!
No worries, Rosie! I hated Carano’s acting in the role on Mando (was it even acting? She looked lost most of the time!), that’s why I remember her well, so I can avoid her everywhere now 🤣
Star Wars, along with gamers, has some of the worst sexist fandoms in geek culture.
If I look at more female dominated fandoms, I usually find a lot of anti-racism, pro-LGBTQ+, pro feminism people that share fanart and fanfic together. A lot of them found each other on Tumblr (and are refinding each other there again as many people fleed Twitter to go back).
When I venture outside Tumblr, some fanfic websites dominated by women and LGBTQ+ etc, I am surprised to see the level of hate there is amongst straight men dominated geek fandoms.
Agree @michaelacat and then I actually always think of the Lord of the flies. Do kids still read that in school? They really should. Despite it being fiction it’s an accurate portrayal of what happens when you put a bunch of young men on an Island.
Around the turn of the millenium, I ran a SW archive/webgroup that started as just female fans, because the environment was so toxic in mainstream spaces. It was so bad that the owner of one major fansite – which hosted R-rated fanfiction – ordered his followers not to link to us on their own websites and webgroups or he’d de-list them from his site because we – wait for it – hosted R-rated fanfiction. But it was girls’ fanfiction, so it was icky.
That is crazy!
Especially seeing how strong women are in fanfiction circles in general (anime, tv series, even some types of games etc).
Just because Star Wars has so many male fans, he immediately tried to push you to the fringe.
This is something that happens a lot by the way, and not just in fandoms.
Things that were originally female majority spaces get attacked by men when they want to enter and then they try to shove the women to the side. Goes for professions as well. Example: programmers used to be mostly women. Then, when men started to realize this was where the future was at, they got pushed out. And now people are claiming there are not many women in tech because we are naturally not gifted at it!!!!! CRAZY!
“…it’s a man’s little thing. Let them have it”
Is that person insane? Right from the jump Princess Leia was a main character, and one of the only one of the main characters who had a clue what was at stake, and was fighting like mad on for good.
Like, bro-dudes get to cos play their favorite athletes and it’s considered 100% mainstream culture and normal (because wearing a team jersey with your fave’s name on it is cos play boys) and the guys who go shirtless and paint their bodies team colors, deck out their cars, homes with team swag are celebrated, featured in the press.
Sci-fi and nerd culture is already marginalized and historically has been mocked to begin with, and that “expert” thinks girls and women should be excluded from that space too? And is willing to go on record saying that to the world? Just because jerks are sexist and think all pop culture needs to be all about them all the time and they get to police it and shut down women’s voices, their very existence in those spaces? What a maroon!
Guys, grow up, do better. Stop viewing the world as zero sum, be respectful of your fellow human beings and maybe find something more productive and uplifting to do with your time than trash talking women, bullying them, trying to drive them off the face of the planet and stuffing ratings on imdb Rotten Tomatoes and other online ratings sites in a meaningless quest to “win” and tank female led or even female including productions.
It’s that kind of self-centered male primacy that leads Scorcese to center a film like KotFM on the white dudes, and the Oscars to skip over GG and MR and leave them out of the discussion. Do better guys.
If I were a female Star Wars fan, I’d do female only conventions.
The men can have their own where no women can enter, including staff or performers.
Watch them screaming, crying, throwing up when there are no more female Leia cosplayers. They can take photos with 20 Han Solos.
Kahn sounds like your basic self-hater who makes bank off feminism’s opportunities–but looks down on women because they aren’t as “strong, successful, smart, whatever” as she is.
I have been known to cuss out complete strangers over star wars, especially when the rise of Skywalker came out. As an og star wars super fan, I am not having it.
My favorite tactic is to highlight that women have a stronger connection to the force because we can create life. Their heads explode. Just toxic nerd brain matter all over the place.
And as a former dungeon diva, I feel it’s my obligation to inflict pain. I’m very proud of my community pushing back. The future of the galaxy is female.
” My favorite tactic is to highlight that women have a stronger connection to the force because we can create life.”
OMG LOL You’re my hero.
I can imagine the tantrums.
I saw the original Star Wars in 1977 when I was 10 years old and fell immediately in love with Princess Leia. My father took me to that movie and took me back 20 more times that year to see it. I literally have a Star wars room in my house.
The fan boys have always been toxic in sci-fi fandoms but in some aspects it is getting better. I passed on my love of Star Wars to my oldest niece and we nerd out together.
But I do need to steal that quote the next time some nerd boy talks about men being ‘better Jedi.’ 😀
I played DND many decadessssss ago in a group that I think had four or five dudes and me. One night they decided to play but not tell me and they played my character and killed her off. Ithelinn RIP
On a separate, but very delightful note (for me), I just learned that bropriating, hepeating and manologues are now being recognized in addition to mansplaining.
https://www.expansivewoman.co/post/how-to-deal-with-mansplaining-hepeating-and-bropriating-at-work
The first sci-fi writer was Mary Shelley, a woman.
The first known writer we know by name in history was Enheduanna, a woman who lived more than 4000 years ago.
Funny how they always think things like ‘writing’ and ‘storytelling’ are theirs.
Pretty obvious that stories were mostly told and passed on by women.
The brothers Grimm wrote down a lot of stories, but gave it their own far less feminist twists and made the women more passive (waiting for a prince to save them instead of coming up with solutions themselves).
“It’s about time that we had a woman come forward to shape a story in a galaxy far, far away.
….except the movie is literally being written by a white man? (64 year old British screenwriter Steven Knight).
A white man is literally the one shaping the plot and dialogue…and STILL they wet their diapers over an offhand comment. 🙄
Exactly, a man is still writing female characters for SW….
I’m a very casual Star Wars fan, but I find it hilarious that white men complain about the presence of women and POCs as being “too woke” when they’re ok with literal aliens and weird life forms being part of the S.W. multiverse. The human beings that actually exist on Earth are the ones who are breaking their brains though.
Some of these toxic fanboys are millenials and younger. They need to know that when Star Wars came out, EVERYONE went to see it. I was too young to see the OG Star Wars in movie theaters, but I still vividly remember family trips to see Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. Those were major events: we waited in long lines with our parents to see the films. We played with our Star Wars toys as we waited. My brother and I were fortunate to be able to get all of the toys: light sabers, Xwing fighters, tie fighters, every little random robot action figure on screen for 2 seconds (like R5D4–the red version of Artoo who blew up when Owen Lars picked it to go home with 3PO). I used to enjoy talking Star Wars in the 1990s–some men would be a little surprised, but then again many of them played star wars with their sisters too. I can recall many fun conversations with friends as we acted out scenes, laughing as we spoke the languages or made references. Star Wars brought people together.
Now, I don’t bother telling anyone I used to love Star Wars. The fanboys have made the universe so toxic with their racism and gatekeeping and misogyny that I want no part of any open community. Those idiots don’t realize that women have always enjoyed science fiction and geeky things–we’re not trying to impress dweebs for “pick me” points. I will admit, I do love the idea of some millenial dude trying to mansplain/gatekeep Star Wars to me so I can say “SIT YOUR ASS DOWN LITTLE CHILD!” and go off.
It’s even dumber because fandoms could be a way of bringing people together–it can be a entry point to ease the loneliness and isolation that plagues so many today. But the toxic fans decided to act like “It’s MY playhouse! No Girls Allowed!”.
I wouldn’t be surprised if these people end up destroying the very franchises they try to police. We need prominent actors to say, “I don’t want to play a role in this film because I don’t want the headache–I don’t want to be doxxed and threatened with rape and murder just for playing a character in a film”.
Or will it take a so-called fan actually doing harm to a performer for this nonsense to stop?
This is why I can’t be bothered anymore. Gen X needs to grow up and get over their childhood stuff
100% agree. There are real issues in the world and people could be volunteering for a Biden campaign or collecting toys for the needy or advocating for gun control or SO many things. These fanboys sound terribly immature and incel-ish.
I’ve always really enjoyed SW, but it wasn’t until The Mandalorian that I was truly invested in that galaxy. Every space that I go to social media-wise though, I read disparaging comments and dismissive remarks about female characters/directors.
Whenever I see someone use “chick”, I can’t roll my eyes hard enough “these 4 chicks took over Moff Gideon’s ship, ridiculous”, “the Ahsoka show doesn’t interest me, all chick characters”, “Bo-Katan took over Mando season 3, disgusting”, “The Acolyte will be horrible, the female director doesn’t like men”.
And the hate wielded against Kathleen Kennedy is out of bounds. She has her share of mistakes – like every male studio head. But the tone and words of the criticism are almost always mixed with misogyny.
Fan theories about characters and/or stories don’t pan out as desired: Kathleen Kennedy must have meddled, she is at fault
The Mandalorian S3: KK is at fault
Obi-Wan Kenobi: KK is at fault
The Book of Boba Fett: KK is at fault
Andor, The Mandalorian S1+2, The Bad Batch, Tales of the Jedi: Gilroy, Favreau, Filoni are great
Thank God, men, Star Wars has a woman that will be blamed for all of the men’s work that is criticised but never gets credit for any of the men’s work that is lauded.
I find this mindset amusing, though particularly so when you’re talking about a pop culture phenomenon like SW, because it tells you how much fandom spaces are inadvertently gender segregated by type. Conventions? Toy collections? You’ll find men dominating. But the creative backbone? The artists? The fanfic writers? The musicians? The zine creators? Very female dominated and always has been. Men just can’t see past their own nose to realize their way of celebrating things isn’t the only way.
Point in fact — Reylo fandom? Produced a fair number of successful authors who crossed over into original fiction and made bank. So many male executives are missing out on millions all because they’re too intent on keeping girls out of the tree house.
My mother and I have gone to every SW film on opening day since A New Hope (she still buys my ticket, because Tradition). I love it when little boys try to tell me SW isn’t for women.
I was 9 years old when Star Wars came out. My parents took me and my sister and we didn’t have a TV or do media things. I got a T-shirt and I wore it every day. I mean, every day. I didn’t want to wash it because I didn’t want to take it off. That was when movies came out and they stayed in theaters until they stopped making money. SW was in the theater forever. Not for girls… whatever.