These Precious Things: Part Two

THESE PRECIOUS THINGS

A Feminist Critique of the Magical Girl Archetype as Seen in 

Puella Magi Madoka Magica 

 This is an analysis of the first season of the anime series, based on subtitles. I understand that this means it is being translated and some word meanings may change, so it is best to view this as a critique from my understanding of the story. That should go without saying, but sometimes people need to be reminded. Also, spoilers. If you don't like spoilers, do not continue reading.

PART ONE: Stock Girls with Vast Potential

"Now I wish to introduce the following idea. Between the age limits of nine and fourteen there occur maidens who, to certain bewitched travelers, twice or many times older than they, reveal their true nature which is not human, but nymphic (that is, demoniac); and these chosen creatures I propose to designate as "nymphets." ~ Nobokov, Lolita

The story begins with Madoka Kaname, a 14 yr old girl who looks quite a bit younger than this. She has pink hair and pink eyes, but this seems to be normal for this world. She is having a deeply distorted nightmare where another girl is being attacked. A cute little white creature with big ears and pink eyes tells her she can save the girl and alter all reality if she just makes a contract with it (the creature) and becomes a magical girl. Madoka wakes up and assumes this is just a dream.

We meet her family, a toddler brother, a stay-at-home dad, and a mother who is a beautiful and successful career woman with a drinking problem. Drunk mamas are   a common motif in anime, but in this case, while Madoka's mother has issues with alcohol and occasionally gives crap advice, more often than not, she gives decent advice and seems truly concerned about her children.

Madoka goes to school and we begin to get what we believe will be the core of the color-coded Magical girl gang. Hitomi Shizuki is a shy girl with green hair and green eyes. Sayaka Miki is loud and has blue hair and eyes. This is all very typical of Magical Girl stories. Most of the time, the girls will have rather stock personalities (Shy Girl, Sweet Girl, Loud Girl, Brooding/Mysterious Girl, Nurturing Girl, and Aggressive Girl. Sometimes, we also get Hungry Girl or Horny Girl. Occasionally, these last two are combined with other traits, as they happen to be in this case).

Once they are at school, they meet Homura Akemi, a transfer student who looks just like the girl from Madoka's dreams. Homura has long black hair and dark purplish/blueish eyes. She is mysterious and brooding.  She seems angry when she sees Madoka, who seems to remember her from more than just the dream.  Later, aspects of the dream become more clear when Madoka and Sayaka find the cute little creature that spoke to her in the dream and meet another girl named Mami. Mami defeats a witch and confirms to them that yes, Magical Girls are real. The little creature, Kyubey, tells the two girls that they should join the ranks of the Magical Girls. They have vast potential for it.

It is in this concept of "vast potential" that we see our first metaphor for the lives of many young girls.  When a girl is born, she has potential, but for many years, this related only to herself. As girls age, however, their selves and their potential becomes less about them and more about how it can become a social asset. As girls begin to mature, their sense of objectification grows. People look at them in terms of what can be gained from them.

One of the side themes of Madoka is the fashion of the Lolita subculture.  All of our magical girls transform into Loli warriors, Madoka herself being the most definitive of this. And yes, Loli very much is in fashion right now and that shapes how the anime will look. But on the other hand, the style of dress and other elements of how the girls look (pigtails and ribbons, knee socks, and various very little girl elements combined with the clear signs of secondary sexual characteristics) blurs the girls out of reality and more into what Nobokov says in the above quote.  Not human.

What Nobokov is actually saying, when you strip out all the pseudo defiance and poetic license, is that between the ages of nine and fourteen, some girls begin to sexually mature, but retain the innocence of being children. I don't mean virginity here . . .though that is certainly part of it.  I refer more to their belief that life can be good, that romance can be pure and perfect.  They're not jaded. They're not demanding.

In short, they're beautiful, ignorant, and pliable . . . with vast potential to be used.  Kyubey wishes for the girls to make a contract with it. The contract will be devastating to them, but that isn't as important Kyubey, who sees the girls only as a means to an end. They are tools, supplies. It knows they will suffer, but their suffering is an important aspect in what it needs.

In the lives of many teenaged girls, this same kind of message is driven home. "You have vast potential . . . to be the status symbol for someone." "You have vast potential . .  . to tend to someone else's sexual needs." "You have vast potential . .. . to be a wife/mother/caretaker."  The message that girls often receive is about how they can use their talents, gifts, intelligence, and beauty to tend to others. Quite often when they seem determined to use their potential for themselves, they are sent the message that this is selfish and wrong. Vast potential . . . for the sake of everyone else.

Ring around the Finger, Pocket full of Creepy

Of all the Dystopian lit I've read of the years, the one that always fills me with the most dread is Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale.  Not on a personal level, mind you. As a loudmouthed fat woman, I expect to be shot. Actually, with most other dystopian stories, I expect that too . . . and often in life the way some people act, but more so from the Atwood story.

Back when she wrote this, a lot of people thought it was reactionary and needlessly shocking. Nothing like this could ever happen. Women had achieved more freedom and were now taking care of themselves.

The thing about stripping people of their rights, however, is that it is best done slowly, and under the proper context.  A grand example of this is the religiously based abstinence movement.  While on the surface it proclaims to promote the welfare of the young people, at its core, one finds a very dark stain of traditional patriarchal views.

Fortunately, most of us have something on our side.  I like to call this the DAMN! THAT IS CREEPY reaction.  This usually happens when we see something that looks innocent but is rather wrong and nasty.

Look at the basic pledge asked of young people from the True Love Waits program.

"I am making a commitment to myself, my family, and my Creator, that I will abstain from sexual activity of any kind before marriage. I will keep my body and my thoughts pure as I trust in God's perfect plan for my life."
The pledge is far cleaned up from its original versions, or even later versions that got kind of crazy, but it still has its roots in fairly oppressive language.

There is nothing wrong with making a commitment to self.  That part, I am not upset about, however, the rest?

I will state this hear and now, just in case for some reason people don't grasp this, being overly concerned about or overly controlling about your child's sex life is creepy. The idea that you would ask your child to COMMIT to you about their sexual activity is emotional incest.  This goes for any deities out there as well.  If they are overly concerned with people's sex lives, that's also creepy.

Look, I get the basic idea that what they're trying to achieve here is some level of thought process before 14 yr olds go hoping into bed with everyone.  That can lead to a lot of problems, hurt feelings, babies, and diseases.

However, having them make a pledge that strips them of basic sexual autonomy is not the answer.  This pledge takes their sexuality away from them, tying it to their parents and to a deity. The subtext suggests they have no exclusive ownership to their own sexuality, rather is is something to which all the mentioned parties have rights.

If you follow this path, you'll find yourself not too far away from cultures where parents decide who their children marry, ones where women can be killed for the "impurity" suffered after rape, and ones where mutilation of genitalia is seen as an acceptable practice in curbing female sexual appetite.

However, True Love Waits is a feminist ANTHEM compared to this crap.

Okay, so this pledge is to the girl's father, her future husband, and her creator.  Not to herself. Not even to her mother, just her father, and then to the husband and the deity.

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

The funny part about this whole issue, for me, comes back to the fact that all of the people I know who could be sexual but choose to stay virgins, are NOT religious and NEVER took a purity pledge. They are people who simply choose to abstain from the whole relationship thing.  They have watched their families and everyone's families and everyone's relationships and decided it wasn't for them.  Sexuality isn't that important.

I asked them why they felt that way when I was thinking about this post. The consensus seemed to be that the whole thing was never presented to them by their parents or others to be something so forbidden and urgent.

All of them were taught it was something they could control with ease, could make their own decisions about, and would never be judged by their loved ones if those decisions weren't the ones they (the loved ones) would have chosen. They were told about the consequences, were told how to prevent them, and even allowed access to the methods used to accomplish this. In other words, it wasn't forbidden. But it was demystified.

Of course, I suppose for some religions, the last example is even worse than people having sex before marriage.  People choosing of their own free will to opt out of the whole relationship/marriage/sex/baby thing scares them.  They WANT people to be virgins, but they mostly really want them to be virgins until they getmarriedhavebabies. Failing that, they want them to not be virgins, have sex that makes them feel bad about themselves, and then find (or refind) religion and getmarriedhavebabies.

In the end, purity pledges are about one thing and one thing only. Control. The social group (church/school/society/whathaveyou) trying to control the bodies of other people, to control the activities of said bodies, and control the minds and mindsets connected to the bodies. "No sex until marriage" has the implied concept that marriage will (and must) happen. "Sex is there for bonding couples, but mostly for making babies" implies that children should be seen as a certainty.

And more children born into the group means more members to control. And the beast keeps feeding itself.