Sometimes Flags are Only Red in Hindsight

When I was a teenager, I was obsessed with Joss Whedon’s cult hit show Firefly; as an adult, it led me directly into an abusive relationship.

I was a fairly average teen who was fascinated with borders and boundaries — the fringes of society, of acceptability. Pushing people until they reached their edge and toying with their expectations. I wasn’t “cool” but I wasn’t a “loser” and I had several friendship circles that bordered both these cliques; I wanted to straddle the boundaries of my social groups and being fascinated with something “nerdy” like Firefly while participating in “cool” activities like clubbing and skipping school gave me a huge thrill.

I started watching it purely for this rush (oh, and because a boy I had a crush on suggested it to me — but honestly, aren’t crushes why teenagers do most things? Not exactly groundbreaking!) but I stayed for the characters. Seeing badass women fighting fights, fixing engines, standing up for themselves, and wearing overalls — I was hooked.

I was fighting the first feelings of queerness at the time and these women spoke to each facet of my personality, both suppressed and superficial: Inara’s ownership over her sexuality was hugely attractive on both levels. Kaylee’s combination of cute and clever spoke to me. Zoe’s no-bullshit attitude did things to me that I never even knew were possible. Then River — well. Her ethereal energy combined with sharp fighting skills and the fact that everybody was fascinated with her while also harbouring an intense need to nurture her, confused me in a way that I have only just begun to articulate. Added to all of this, the storylines are fantastic and exciting. That’s undeniable. This crew of people who straddle the borders of acceptable society, fight the system, root for the vulnerable, commit crimes in the name of good. I was in my element.

So when, at the not-so-tender age of 18, I met a man who felt the same way about this universe — a handsome man who also ticked several other boxes upon first impression — I was already starting to fall for him. We shared our loves and our frustrations with the series, we immediately began re-watching it together, and he introduced me to so much more. He was a real fanboy of the Whedon brothers, and after getting into Firefly, had delved more and more into Joss Whedon’s filmography until he was fully immersed. At the time, I thought that was cool. A guy who’s not afraid to be passionate and to share those passions: to get really — in the true definition of the word — nerdy.

But these were the warning signs.

It took me years after our break-up to look back on those first few months together with anything but rose-tinted glasses. It took until I began reading stories of Joss Whedon’s horrific behaviour to his wife and his conduct on set before the glasses started to slip.

I was shocked at first; a man who had built his entire career on creating strong female characters? A man who is essentially a nerd — a man with typically a low amount of social power? A man whose public brand is self-proclaimed feminism? It was confusing to reconcile the image of Whedon being portrayed through Kai Cole’s statements and through stories from actors on set (most notably Ray Fisher and Charisma Carpenter), with the man who inspired a generation of girls to wear leather jackets and fight monsters. But then it hit me. Square between the eyes. The faux-feminist. The chauvo-feminist (a term coined by Sam Mills). The man I was tied to for years, reeled in by promises of feminism and understanding, then blindsided by abuse.

Joss Whedon and my ex are the same type of guy.

I can’t say for certain if there was a level of kinship that my ex saw in Whedon’s work that drew him to it or if the similarities developed over time, but they function in the same way. They are both, at heart, nerds. Nerds who still feel like insecure teens and don’t realise the power they wield as grown men. Nerds who have harnessed the potential of aligning themselves with women. Nerds who struggle with consolidating the masculinity they have been socialised to perform and the statements they know they ‘should’ be making. Who, at times, may not even understand that the way they are acting is misogynistic because they’ve consciously been parodying phrases from Third-Wave Feminism since before it was cool.

They may not be pick-up artists in the traditional sense, but they have cottoned on to the fact that by setting themselves apart as “nice guys”, they can create and own a space to which women come running. And once women are in those spaces, it doesn’t matter what they actually do to them. It doesn’t matter what their actions are in private because they are men who have publicly, bravely, self-identified as feminists. They watch films that have women in them! They read poetry about women — and sometimes even by women! They retweet women comedians, like, all the time.

So who’s going to believe the accusations?

The culture that Joss Whedon created is one that thrives on the superficiality of this dichotomy. On paper, all his shows and movies portray strong women. Women who defy expectations and cross social boundaries. But these women are also sexy. Society-defined sexy. And in the end, these women often wind up romantically with A Nice Guy. A guy who represents Whedon himself and therefore offers himself up as aspirational for his fans. A guy who’s been there since the beginning, biding his time, subtly negging the women around him until they notice his nice-guy attitude.

In Firefly, when we look more closely it’s a hotbed of these performances. The main character’s love interest is consistently belittled for the agency she has over her own sexuality. The engineer may dress butch and have oil on her face, but don’t worry, she’s as femme as they come, just waiting for someone to indulge her strawberry dress fantasies. And of course, the damsel in distress who has spent her entire life needing to be saved by her brother. The whole programme revolves around River requiring protection from the men in crew as they are both her predators and her saviours.

There are so many writers, directors, and everyday men out there who are thriving on this philosophy. The philosophy that if you say you’re a feminist, you are. If you make sure to compliment a woman’s strength, then it doesn’t matter if you were staring at her breasts. If you cry, it doesn’t matter that the tears are because you were told off for being a misogynist — the vulnerability of crying outweighs the reason. If you put a woman as the winner of a fight scene then it doesn’t matter what happens to her afterwards. If you have a copy of We Should All Be Feminists on your bookshelf, then it doesn’t matter how you actually treat your girlfriend. These men look up to Whedon — to the nice guys who win the girls.

In my opinion, this is one of the most potent and dangerous forms of sexism and abuse — because it’s in disguise. It’s toxic masculinity wearing the cloak of sensitivity. It’s men hiding behind other men who are lauded for their behaviour. It’s men hiding amongst groups of women with a sign saying “I can’t be sexist, look at all these women around me”. A vicious cycle of self-fulfilment: man surrounds himself with women by enticing them with faux-feminist pick-up lines, then uses these women to further embolden himself and ‘prove’ to other women how little of a threat he is. We’ve all encountered these men and it’s time we start calling them out.