Lit No Imperial Sexism in the New Canon

Science fiction and fantasy are genres where allegories about racisim and sexism can be told without having to make it an explicit point. Imperials looking down upon locals and alien species are ways to work in those ideas without the problematic notion of making them stated plot points. The fact that there's high ranking women in the First Order and Imperials gives them a bit of shading (and more fan event costume options!) instead of dragging in an antiquated notion like sexism as an easy way to make them "bad".

 

The new canon is filed with female Imperials. One thing that bugs me though is even though we're seeing tons of females play key roles in the Empire in the new canon, the book Smuggler's Run says this about Alicia Beck:

"She was a woman--and there were very few of those holding high ranks in the Empire."

Seems contradictory to what we've seen in the canon so far but whatever.

 

It would have been good to have sexism in the empire then have the first order do away with it as sign how it means to improve on the empire's flaws

 

Except, to all appearances, the "flaws" the First Order is "improving" on are the areas where they feel the Empire was too humane.

 

Maybe there are thousands of high ranking women in the empire while there are millions of higher ranking men?

 

Daala wasn't envisioned and presented, at least early on, as being a character that slept her way to the top. Quality of her presentation by KJA aside he intended her to be a very capable tactician who was held down due to her gender. It was pointed towards in his narrative as something that was very wrong with the Empire(as it is wrong in society) - so it was engaged.

Very few, including yourself, give actual credit to Daala for her actual accomplishments when these topics come up.

So yeah, I guess I'm going there. When you say Daala is a character who "allegedly slept her way to the top" you are fueling the fire. You are the audience and you are still running with it. The actual narrative from the Jedi Academy trilogy is that she was an excellent officer and tactician and that narrow minded male officers in the Empire viewed her as having slept her way to the top, when in fact she didn't, which is made explicitly clear in the books.

 

Then why have her be in a relationship with Tarkin at all? Why even have the other officers question her because of that?

 

To highlight the problems with that POV and show the readers that it shouldn't be like that and that the Empire was wrong for allowing that to happen.

Why is it OK to default to a fan created narrative of her character to describe her? Why is it OK to use her story arc as an example of why the Legends Empire actually really wasn't sexist at all? Because she made it all up in her head despite us getting first hand accounts the behavior?

 

The way I remember it...

-JAT establishes her relationship with Tarkin
-JAT establishes sexist reasons for her not to have been promoted
-the story that unfolds makes a strong case that she's not that great of a tactician

Readers are then left to draw their own conclusions.

But it's been almost twenty years; maybe I'm forgetting something.

ETA: doesn't touch on the Tarkin angle, but here's some recent evidence re: KJA's thinking:

 

I, uh, actually liked Tavira.

 

In Death Star, Tarkin at least thinks that Daala could have made it to the top without his help.

And in the newcanon, he doesn't seem condescending toward Ciena and her ambitions.

Maybe it's only Leia that Tarkin is condescending toward?

 

And condescending =/= sexist. Leia is the only Rebel we see him interact with, there's no reason to think he'd be more respectful toward a man.

 

It should be like the one time Lando runs into a racist--like, "they still make you?"

 

He might have with Luke. His condescension towards Leia could be perceived as him treating her as a little girl. She's only 19, after all, and Han was snapping at Luke like he was a kid, too (which he was!). So had Prince Luke Organa been on the Death Star giving Tarkin lip, Tarkin probably would've been treating him like a boy in over his head. That's my take on it, anyway...

 

Don't forget Han's remark about "female advice" in ANH after they get out of the garbage masher.

 

Well, even if the Empire isn't overtly sexist, you can still sneak a few things in here and there.

Instead of something obvious, like literally putting Daala in the kitchen like they did, it could be more subtle. Instead of just saying it, they could leave it for us to catch.

I'll try some examples, though I'm probably not the best source for this.

You have the "cold *****" professional woman who is a "cold *****" even though she's only just as ambitious and "take charge" as any other man in a position of power.

And, you know, you could take out the sexual relationship with the boss, and retain the suspicion of incompetence simply because she's a woman. She walks into a room, and a few of the men in that room immediately think she's not as good as this guy or that guy. You can have women constantly having to prove their competence, no matter how many times they've demonstrated it.

You can have men and women working together...and for some reason the man gets the credit. "Good job, young man" *ignores woman*

You can have men interrupting a woman while she is talking.

You can show different reactions to emotions. Man expresses anger? Show him respect and deference. Woman expresses anger? Let's all roll our eyes at the hysterical woman.

Then, of course, there's the whole kids thing. A man has kids? Congratulations! A real family man, we can depend on him now. A woman has a child? We can't depend on her anymore, she's going to be more focused on her kid. You can drop in a "so, when are you getting married?" Probably a less subtle example.

You can flip it around and have men annoyed with having to do "women's work".

Or you can go less subtle and have women naval officers fetching coffee and being mansplained to about how shields work.

I don't think I'd tolerate stuff like "slut" and "whore" being bandied about, though. I'd criticize that quickly as just in very bad taste.

 

I'm fond of the idea that a group can be filled with Men and Women alike who all joined for their own reasons, but ultimately believe in what they're fighting for. Even if what they're fighting for is awful. I see it enough in reality to not think it strange in the Empire or the First Order. You can believe in gender equality but also believe those who disagree with your principles deserved to be crushed.

 

So, it'll be Star Wars Blazing Saddles, Han and Lando on a backwards, arse-end of nowhere planet and Han saying to Lando...

 

Or, they do away with it because they can't afford not to. I rather like the idea that the OLD Empire (under Palpatine) limited their options to human men, so that non-humans (Thrawn) or women (Daala) had to really fight to make it to the top. The new Empire (First Order) is trying to gain the power that the Old Empire lost, so if they have female supporters or non-human supporters, they take advantage of that because they don't have the luxury of turning them away.

 

Me, too. She wasn't just another megalomaniacal warlord. She was a tier below that, just a pirate boss, but very good at what she did. She was able to subvert a sect of Force-users without even being Force-sensitive herself, which is impressive, and she was also able to hold together a whole bunch of different pirate, gangster, and smuggler factions, which speaks well for her leadership and political skills. And even after her organization's destroyed, she's never caught. She's okay in my book.