Board Thread:Character Discussion/@comment-11058666-20150901033946

Let's be honest, people are much quicker to sympathize with female characters than male characters. I know I am. Guilty as charge. :P, a sexist, yet popular thought is that women are too fragile and emotional to be held responsible for their actions. Nobody takes women hurting men that seriously. They're even excused for it, sometimes. A man hurting a woman is a horrible crime, but a woman hurting a man means that the man is spineless. At least that's what society has been groomed to think.

OUAT's own fictional society represents this. Everyone usually feels inclined to forgive the female villains, despite all the horrible things they've done, but nobody wants to forgive the male villains. I've seen that despite Regina condemning everyone in the Enchanted Forest to Storybrooke and taking their memories, they forgive her. Despite Zelena killing Neal in cold blood, turning everyone into monkeys, trying to murder Henry, and just generally making an attempt to destroy Storybrooke, they forgive her. However, everyone is down to try to get rid of Rumple any chance they get. Snow wanted to let him die instead of taking down the actual threat--Cora. He is seen as unforgivably horrible, when Regina and Cora were actually worse than him. He didn't try to destroy Storybrooke until S4, and people still treated him like he was a bomb waiting to go off. Everyone shrugged off Regina and Cora's massacres, but were so fixated on every little bad thing Rumple did, like stealing Cinderella's baby and beating up some people in Storybrooke. I'm not saying he should get a pass, I think they should all go to jail. XD, it's just that the fact that female villains seem to automatically be absolved of crime just for being female and male villains are supposed to not be redeemable in any way is ridiculous.

Be honest. Would you really call a man who left his crippled, kindly wife and daughter to live in filth while he ran off with a rich pirate girl brave? That's Milah, Rumple, Bae, and Hook with the genders switched. Would you really call a woman who raped and enslaved a young woman who loved and protected animals for failing to kill a sweet young man magnificent and great? That's Regina and the Huntsman with the genders switched. Would you really call a man who abused, enslaved, drove crazy, and murdered the son of a powerless woman a wonderful character? That's Zelena and Rumple with the genders switched. I know you wouldn't. I wouldn't. Men are automatically seen as horrible and women are automatically seen as the innocent victim in everything. OUAT just promotes that idiotic train of thought. This is what I hate about this show, lol. 