Real Women Don't Wear Dresses/Playing With

Basic Trope: Femininity in women is treated as negative.

Straight: The Wrench Wench and the Action Girl are presented as more admirable than the cook.
Exaggerated: A Jerkass Sue never wears dresses or pink, is solely interested in machinery and guns, would starve to death in a fully equipped kitchen, physically attacks men who express attraction toward her, and is treated as admirable, while a woman who wears dresses or cooks is treated as utterly contemptible (perhaps with any traits meriting contempt being an Informed Attribute, perhaps with no traits other than femininity to warrant it).
Justified: The Action Girl was Raised by Dudes and can't quite shake the habit of being masculine from being raised that way, even if she actually wants to wear a dress or cook.
Inverted: Femininity in women is treated as a positive.
Subverted: Sally, the cook, is shown taking decisive command after some trouble.
Double Subverted: But she reveals that she was pretending to be the cook so no one would take her seriously; actually she got that pathetic loser Violet to do the cooking.
Parodied: When Sally's gun jams from all the accumulated dirt, she explains that cleaning is something she refuses to be stereotyped into doing.
- Ki mi ko wants to join Scarlett's Amazon Brigade, but they refuse because she's too girly. Then at a later point, Scarlett finds out to her horror that Xandra knows how to cook, and promptly kicks her out. Soon afterwards the team chucks out Alice because she's not a lesbian, then Maxine because they find out she wore a dress to a formal event once... Finally, Scarlett is the only one left. She goes to fight the Big Bad alone, only to find out he's already been single-handedly defeated by - you've guessed it - Kimiko. Scarlett doesn't react well.
- The only people who are treated as "real women" are, in fact, Transsexualism men. "REAL WOMEN GET PHALLOPLASTIES!!!"
Deconstructed: The non-feminine women wear down the feminine ones and persuade them to give femininity up. Leading to their going hungry in a filthy house until the teams breaks up because everyone refuses to be considerate of each other.
- By treating any traditionally 'feminine' actions as stereotypical and demeaning, the supposedly Badass and 'hardcore' women are reinforcing the same negative stereotypes they claim to be rallying against as feminists.
Reconstructed: The team only agrees to work together when household chores are handed out as official assignments. The Action Girl will gladly do the laundry if it's an order as opposed to female obligation that carries a "girlish" stigma. Whereupon everyone complains about the shoddy housekeeping and they have to crack down and ensure that they are done well.
Zig Zagged: The Action Girl, Alice, is treated badly by the men because she's very feminist. The ladies treat her badly for the same reason too. A Crowning Moment of Awesome leads the men to treat her better, but the ladies still aren't convinced. Later, one of these ladies, Diane, must defeat the Big Bad in a test to prove her badassery. She learns that Alice defeated him with no trouble. Diane initially wants to commit suicide, but Alice convinces her to embrace her feminism. Then Alice goes into a nearby bathroom and blows herself up with a grenade. Why? Because she was actually ashamed to be a feminist.
Averted: Strength of character and feminine traits have no relationship to each other in the female characters.
Enforced: Girls Need Role Models.
Lampshaded: "Pffft! Look at this doormat playing the harp, wearing those swishy silken dresses, looking all fragile and shit! Let's beat her up! It's not like she'll be able to fight back anyway..."
- "Femininity is about being weak, incompetent and useless. When was the last time you saw a woman achieving something great for the world by being feminine?"
Invoked: "I can't cook. It will turn me all girlie and then I won't be able to fight!"
Defied: Despite jeering, Sally cooks, doesn't shoot guns, and still runs the team.
Discussed: "You ever notice that women don't seem to be allowed to be feminine around here anymore?"
Conversed: "Why is it such a bad thing to be feminine?" "Because it makes you look weak and incapable."
Played For Laughs: Idiot Hero Bob is struck dumb when he sees Action Girl Alice in a dress -- not because She Cleans Up Nicely, but because "OMG you're wearing a dress! I thought you were Badass!" Alice promptly puts his head through the nearest wall.
Played For Drama: Alice feels she has to fit the "strong woman" stereotype to be taken seriously or have any worth as a person, so she gives up all her feminine interests (even though she really enjoys them), refuses to have anything to do with men, and acts like The Stoic all the time. This takes its toll on her psychologically.
- Carla, a Lady of War, is given All of the Other Reindeer treatment for her femininity, even though she's just as competent as the men and the tomboyish women.
- The Woman Wearing the Queenly Mask

Back to Real Women Don't Wear Dresses