I adore the show Veronica Mars. I came in near the end of the first season, marathoned everything I missed and got several other friends to do so in time for the finale. I faded in and out of the second season — the writers had some difficulties, but even so the show was the best thing on television. And we just finished the first of the three mysteries of the current season.
And I maintain that it’s the best show on the air right now. It’s well written, it’s smart, the characters are three dimensional and realistic (not to mention well acted), the mysteries are exciting and tense, and it’s overall the most compelling thing I’ve seen on TV…well…possibly ever.
So it sucks that such a strong show buys into negative stereotypes of feminism. Which is especially odd, considering that otherwise, the show is very feminist. (Please note that from here on, there will be general spoilers for season three of the show through the 10/28/2006 episode. I won’t be saying whodunit, but details about the arch will be spoiled. Please also note I’ve only seen each episode once — if I’ve gotten a detail wrong, feel free to correct.)
I say the show is feminist for a few different reasons. For one, it has very well written female characters — particularly the titular Veronica. But leaving her aside for a moment, the show also gives us Mac, a realistic nerd girl: she’s smart, she loves computers, she’s mildly socially awkward, she doesn’t worry too much about how she looks. She also breaks the television nerd girl mold in that she finds a guy who appreciates all of those things about her and has a reasonably realistic relationship with him. Awesome. The show also gives us Meg and Parker, similar characters. They’re perky and pretty and blond, and they’re easy to write off as ditzy, but they both have deeper facets to them. Meg is willing to ignore the peer pressure that wants her to blow off Veronica to stick with her friend; Parker comes through a serious trauma and is stronger and braver for it, and her instincts to be a good person and do the right thing lead to her saving the day. And of course, the show gives us Lilly Kane. Lilly should be a traditional negative archetype: she’s a hot teenage girl who likes having sex, and does it often (even cheating on her boyfriend). She’s then killed. But the show doesn’t show us Lilly as a girl who was punished for daring to have (and enjoy!) sex. Instead, through Veronica’s point of view, we see Lilly as a young woman who is in charge of her identity — she’s still a teenager and a lot of what she does is defying her parents, but she won’t let herself be defined by who people think she should be. And she uses her liberation to encourage Veronica to break out of her shell, be smarter, and take control of herself, too. Her death is a tragedy, not punishment for the fact that she dares enjoy sex, and the fact that Veronica loves her is what drives the entire first season of the show.
And of course there’s Veronica. Veronica is smart. Her father is a former sheriff, now private investigator, who she assists; she solves as many mysteries as he does. When she realizes something is deeply wrong with the official version of Lilly’s death, she takes it upon herself to investigate and do everything she can to solve the mystery. She’s well written in that she has a consistent set of skills: she’s smart (and sassy!), quick thinking in a crisis, and she’s an excellent photographer. Those skills combine to let her solve mysteries, put together clues, and be fun to watch doing it. She also has her flaws: she jumps to conclusions, which has put her in serious danger more than once. She can’t trust anyone, not even the people she loves the most. And oh boy, does she hold grudges. So what we get is a strong but still flawed character whose personality drives a show that is dark and not afraid to tackle extremely graphic, violent situations. Like murder. Like rape.
Did I mention Veronica was raped? Shortly after Lilly’s death, the break-up with her seemingly perfect boyfriend, and being ostracized by all of her friends, she went to a party to prove that the gossip didn’t bother her. She was roofied and raped. Of course she immediately took the right steps — she went directly to the sheriff to report the crime. But the sheriff was a complete dick with a grudge against her family and refused to investigate it. Veronica doesn’t take such things lying down, so not only does she often go out of her way to make his life as miserable as possible (which we see many times through the series, in more creative ways than I could imagine), she decides to find the rapist herself — and does so. Despite the sheriff’s negative reaction (and, as we’re supposed to view the sheriff as incompetent and petty, I don’t take away a message that reporting rape is futile, which was a danger with the storyline), rape is always, always treated as a violent crime on the show, akin to murder. (In fact, in the second season, we learn that the murderer behind the season’s mystery is also a rapist, and both the audience and characters are more shocked and angry about the rape than the murders, judging by the people I’ve talked with.) In the first season, one of their mysteries-of-the-week plots is about a young woman who disappears; as the show goes on, it’s revealed that she ran away from home after she was raped, and her mother refused to believe her. The episode is chilling and the subject is never treated lightly.
The first of the three major mysteries of season three is Veronica trying to track down a serial rapist. Whoever he is is loose on her college campus, and his pattern is to drug a girl, rape her, and shave her head. He’s very careful, so no forensic evidence has ever been found. Victims remember nothing. But when one of the victims is Veronica’s friend and Mac’s roommate, she knows she has to take it upon herself to find the rapist and bring him to justice — after all, the sheriff is still incompetent and making no more than token efforts to do it himself. The story arch is disturbing, and I wouldn’t hesitate to say triggering to people sensitive to the issue; there were several moments in the mystery where I went from physically uncomfortable to unable to watch, and shaky.
The problem is that Veronica isn’t the only one trying to solve the rapes. Early on, we’re presented with the women of Lilith House, one of whom (Nish, I believe is her name) is also one of the editors on the newspaper staff. Lilith House is the campus’s feminist group, so it’s entirely appropriate that they’re concerned about the rapes and trying to force the administration to actually do something about it. In fact, I think that their initial idea — shut down the campus frats — is a good one. Whether or not the frats are responsible (and the Liliths believe that they are, to the point of fanaticism), several of the victims were drugged at frat parties, and the party atmosphere easily loans itself to violence against women. However, their vendetta against the frats soon shows itself to be less concern about the rapes and more anger at, well…men. Now, the frats (epitomized by Dick Casablancas, a wonderful character and a horrible person) may have despicable practices, and when those traditions (such as tallying the number of points each woman is worth if a frat brother sleeps with her) are show, they’re presented as disgusting and piggish, no question. Veronica discovers this in the second season and gets the frat suspended for a semester (and in a satisfying scene, tasers the hell out of a couple members). The campus feminists should have a legitimate beef with the frats on that basis alone…but that’s not their concern, either. We’re show that they simply hate the frat with a passion, and will stop at nothing to get it shut down. At first, it seems rational — they believe that the rapes may be happening in a secret room, and Veronica investigates. When she finds is that the secret room has nothing to do with rape, the Liliths are angry and publish an article with the information Veronica found, against her will. They do it out of spite.
Later, the frat in question is accused again, more seriously. It hires Veronica to try and prove its innocence — and she’s more than happy to investigate, hoping to either find the rapist or prove the innocence of several of the suspects. The Liliths, and even Parker, accuse Veronica of defending the frat and siding with the rapist — even when she proves that the frat is innocent. Veronica states again and again that her chief interest is finding who actually did it, not just crucifying the easiest target. The Liliths find this completely unacceptable. Even after it’s proved the frat is innocent, they continue to hate Veronica and do everything in their power to get the frats shut down. It shows them to be a group that’s irrationally angry, and that will stop at nothing to further their own agenda, not the legitimate problem of the on-campus rapes. In other words, they’re a pretty shallow stereotype of feminists; they’re angry at men, they want to ruin everyone’s fun, and they definitely are not doing anything constructive.
Things get worse. The Liliths stage a legitimate demonstration, banding together in a show of strength. I don’t recall exactly what their banner says , but its meaning was that they were standing strong and weren’t going to be scared of rape. It makes a powerful front page on the campus’s newspaper…and the response from a campus humor mag is the photo with the message, ‘Who’d want to rape you? …except the blond in the middle.’ Ha ha ha. It’s a lame shot using rape for humor. It’s understandable that the Liliths — and Veronica — are angry about it, though whether or not the magazine should be censored is another question. However, the shock comes at the end of the episode. Claire, ‘the blond in the middle’, is raped. Obviously, everyone who laughed off the feminist protest is stricken and horrified. It’s extremely powerful.
Then we find out that Claire faked the rape. It was an action the Liliths agreed on — in fact, at least one of the other rapes was faked, I’m not sure how many — because they wanted to Make A Point, and because they wanted to target the frat and get it shut down. Again: this group, which the show identifies as the campus’s feminist group, condones faking rapes. Not only condones, but masterminds the reporting of the fake rapes.
Eventually we find out that they’ve actually sexually assaulted the head of the frat, and their actions were done in revenge for the frat — and specifically, the leader of the frat — harassing one of their members, leading to her attempted suicide. It’s a powerful stor… but in revenge, they’ve essentially raped the frat leader, they’ve capitalized on the real rapes of many women, and they aren’t even doing it in an attempt to stop the rapist. They’re shown to be nothing but a group of angry, petty, vicious man-haters. They’re feminists.
That’s not what feminists are; that’s not what feminism is about. It is, however, the negative feminist stereotype. It’s the reason why a lot of people who are feminists don’t identify as feminists. It’s the ‘bad name’ that we’ve been given. Angry, irrational women, who just like to make people miserable.
I don’t think the show condones their behavior. Of course they’re expelled from the college. Upon discovering their faked rapes, Veronica tells them off. She’s not screaming or angry — at least not outwardly, though one suspects she’s seething inwardly — but what she says is powerful. “You faked rapes. Nothing hurts the cause more than that.” Which is very, very true. It encourages people to disbelive women who report rapes, despite the fact that very few reported rapes are fake. That makes it all the harder and more dangerous for someone like Veronica, who did immediately report being raped and already couldn’t get aid from law enforcement. Except, you know, in real life, not with fictional characters.
My real frustration with the show is that we don’t actually see other people identify as feminists. It’s implied from Veronica’s comment that she does, though I don’t recall it ever being stated outright in any of the three seasons. So here we have a great female character who’s never referred to as a feminist rightfully being angry at a group of violent, shallow characters who do identify as feminists. And that’s fine, if you understand that what they’ve done is wrong and reflects very, very badly on the feminist movement, and if you understand that Veronica is a feminist character. Because for people who buy into the stereotype, what they see is closer to, “Yeah, those feminists are bitches and they’re wrong, and our girl Veronica is right.” Not just a conflict of ideals, but a way to write off a very important, powerful movement.
I have to admit, I’m pissed off at the show for doing that. But even more so, I’m disappointed. The show has always seemed to embrace feminism before, tacitly; it never came up directly. Now that was put directly into play, the show took what I feel was a dangerous — and wrong — view, without making it clear that the view is actually nothing but a negative stereotype. And since the show is generally so well written and clearly much smarter than anything else on air, I can’t even write it off as an innocent but angering mistake. I suppose that even great art can be flawed — but the flaw is all the more disappointing when the art was so great previously.
Alas.
