Queens may fight - Girls may not 1940's vs 2000's

jillthevaliant

jillthevaliant

New member
father christmas

ok, this might soundd a bit rude, but when father christmas appears to give the kids and beavers their gifts, he seems a bit sexist. like when he was giving susan's her bow and arrows and lucy her daggar, he tells the girls that the girls weren't intended to fight in the battle themselves. when lucy asks why not, he says that battles get ugly when women fight! does anyone agree with me here?! i mean, there's really no other way to look at it, is there?!
 
My friend said the same thing when she first read LWW. I had never really given much thought to it until she mentioned it. But you're right. In the books Father Christmas is quite sexist, it kind of like, "you're a girl and you'll make the battle harder than it should be, simply because you ARE a girl." In the movie he's not so bad. He just tells Lucy no, so in the movie it comes off as more of her being too young to go to battle. But in the book he give Susan and Lucy their weapons so they can defend themselves when Peter is not there for them.
 
well, yeah. i know it's all for protection, but still. i don't like how it was worded. i guess it's better, though, the way they worded it in the movie rather than taking it word by word from th e book because there are more feminists in the world today than there probable were back in the 50's.
 
that is sexist-to me its like he is saying"you are too girlish and when you mix girlish stuff witha mans battle it can get ugly"HOW RUDE!!!If i was ever given a dagger or a bow and arrows and my brothers were going into battle yo can bet your a**I would be right there with them!!!
 
Honestly.. the whole movie was like that.. the girls sit around crying while the guys go into war.. seriously. But her wrote this a long time ago when it was considered completely different.
 
jillthevaliant said:
lol. ok. let's start off then with the US. someone first needs to be the 1st female pres!
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My best friend and I are planning.. but I can't be president.. cause I'm from Europe, but she can. We decided in sixth grade originally that she was going to be the first woman president and I'd be the vice.. you can be a vice president and be foreign right?
 
umm..i don't think so. actually, not sure, that was a long time ago that we learned about this stuff. anyway, back to the subject...WOMEN RULE!!! (sorry to the guys out there, guys are pretty sweet too///)
 
Refreshing sentiment in this thread - I got the impression that the general opinion on this forum was in the other direction. Good to see it isn't all one way traffic. :)

Like the previous posters, I also find the "I do not mean you to fight in the battle" comments made by Father Christmas in the book rather sexist, which is why I'm glad this was changed in the film to more generalised statements about the horrors of war. Furthermore, we get to see Susan and Lucy displaying skill with their respective weapons (bow and arrows for Susan, a dagger for Lucy), and Susan even gets to prove it in battle, slaying the Witch's dwarf.

As has been mentioned, the reason for this sexism is liable to be the fact that C.S. Lewis was born in 1898. He had many ideas which are dated, such as support of coroporal punishment in school (after all, thats how he was taught, so no doubt he saw it as perfectly normal), so it wouldn't surprise me if he made sexist comments in his books without even realising they might cause offence. I'm sure he didn't mean any harm, but with modern eyes there are certain sections in Narnia that (unsurprisingly for a book written half a century ago) seem out of touch.
 
jillthevaliant said:
yes. i agree. i mean, could you just imagine what would have happend if that comment was made in the movie?! i don't think i really want to know..
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Fans of the books probably wouldn't give so much thought to it because they would have known about it, but casual movie-goers would be far less forgiving.
 
i guess...i dunno. i mean, i'm a HUGE fan of the books and while i was re-reading LWW today, i came across that statement and was like, Wow!! Never noticed that before!
 
slideyfoot said:
Refreshing sentiment in this thread - I got the impression that the general opinion on this forum was in the other direction. Good to see it isn't all one way traffic. :)

Like the previous posters, I also find the "I do not mean you to fight in the battle" comments made by Father Christmas in the book rather sexist, which is why I'm glad this was changed in the film to more generalised statements about the horrors of war. Furthermore, we get to see Susan and Lucy displaying skill with their respective weapons (bow and arrows for Susan, a dagger for Lucy), and Susan even gets to prove it in battle, slaying the Witch's dwarf.

As has been mentioned, the reason for this sexism is liable to be the fact that C.S. Lewis was born in 1898. He had many ideas which are dated, such as support of coroporal punishment in school (after all, thats how he was taught, so no doubt he saw it as perfectly normal), so it wouldn't surprise me if he made sexist comments in his books without even realising they might cause offence. I'm sure he didn't mean any harm, but with modern eyes there are certain sections in Narnia that (unsurprisingly for a book written half a century ago) seem out of touch.
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Here's a question for you: how many of today's modern ideas are going to seem out of touch in another half century?
 
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