Buffy was the first piece of evidence that Joss Whedon is an abusive misogynist
Undoubtedly by now, you’ve heard about the latest accusations against Buffy creator Joss Whedon, this time from Charisma Carpenter — Cordelia on the show. Her allegations follow the firing of Ray Fisher, who also has spoken up about Whedon’s abusive behavior on the set of Justice League. This isn’t the first time we’ve heard allegations about Joss Whedon — in fact, it feels like every few months, we hear something new about what an asshole he is. But for some reason, this time feels different, like people actually plan on taking the accusations seriously. I can’t really discern why or what’s different here; we may very well have to attribute this change in attitude to the stars or the pandemic or perhaps the sheer number of times we’ve been in this same place and learned nothing.
There’s no doubt that Carpenter’s allegations — corroborated by several other actors on Buffy, including Amber Benson, who played Tara — are true. There really can be no doubt, at this point, that Joss Whedon is continually abusive on every set he graces. What surprises me, scrolling through social media to look at the mass response to this latest reveal, are all the comments about how Whedon was a “feminist icon” for so many, that Buffy the Vampire Slayer does good things, even if Whedon does not. It surprises me because Buffy, in fact, was the original piece of evidence that Whedon is a raging, abusive misogynist, and yet we, as a society, collectively chose to ignore this in favor of holding it up as the ultimate piece of feminist media, when in actuality, it’s the opposite.
I’m not talking about the obvious grievances of Buffy: the 99% white cast, the continual trauma porn, the gratuitous sexual assault of the main character. That’s all there, and much of that feels like a product of its time. But if you dig deeper, you’ll find that these are not isolated incidences of the show but instead the show’s foundation. At its core, Buffy perpetuates the misogyny it so staunchly insists it’s destroying, all dressed up in the nice bow of “female empowerment.”
There’s a lot I could dig into here: Xander and the toxic masculinity of (nearly, because I refuse to put Oz in this category) all of the male characters; the pathetic characterization of Buffy Summers as the “dumb blonde” that has no basis in reality and instead often feels like a mockery of real teenage girls; or the way women with power in Buffy face unrelenting trauma and/or turn evil. I could go on, but instead I want to focus on the premise of the show: the Slayer as the Chosen One.
Buffy is clearly a power fantasy. When asked about the creation of the show, Whedon himself said that he wanted to reverse that old trope of the blonde girl who died at the beginning of every horror movie, and there are definitely ways that the show does this. Buffy is the ultimate survivor, no matter how much trauma she has to endure to get there. But as good as it feels to watch a teenage girl absolutely kick ass, there’s something really fundamentally off to me about the idea that one girl in the whole world can fight evil and win, using powers that were bestowed on her by — oh, who? —a group of men. This characterization says nothing about women’s ability to survive or flourish in the world; little of Buffy’s survival comes from her own ingenuity or experiences outside of her powers. Save for one brief moment in the pilot when Buffy identifies a vampire by his passé fashion sense, her ability to defeat the demons she comes up against almost never has anything to do with her woman- or personhood. Being a teenage girl is a side-story, even a distraction from her true calling, and never the answer. To link it back to Whedon’s desire for the blonde girl to be able to hold her own, what we’re learning here is: ordinary girls can’t fight back.
And this is our feminist god? It smacks so much of the Cool Girl vibe, that one, special girl gets chosen to (metaphorically, anyway) hang out with the boys — and it doesn’t even have anything to do with her! The whole idea is absolutely indicative of a creator who doesn’t actually believe women are ferocious, strong, or self-sufficient because her powers aren’t even hers — and can be taken from her by the men who gave them to her in the first place.
And, look, I’m not here to tell you that you can’t like Buffy. There’s plenty I enjoy in the show, to be sure: the quips, for one thing, as well as a lot of the characters. And I’m a big believer that a show doesn’t have to be an artistic masterpiece for you to enjoy it; I am, after all, a huge fan of Riverdale, and that show is an absolutely wonderful mess. But Buffy hasn’t been praised as a “bad but lovable show.” People will die on the altar of Buffy, hold it up as a beacon of feminism, and I think it’s important that we examine exactly why we have all been so easily fooled by a show, and a creator, riddled with such blatant misogyny. I don’t really have answers there, only theories: Joss Whedon is a white man, and when white men tell us things, we tend to believe them; people were so starved for anything that looked like feminism, and this show popped up at exactly the right time; we saw the signs but ignored them because, hey, it’s just TV. Likely, it’s a combination of all of these things.
Ultimately, we have to learn how to identify when someone like Whedon is inadvertently telling the truth about themselves the way he did in Buffy. I mean, this man got an award from Equality Now in 2006, which hilariously feels like that moment in Parks and Rec when Ben receives the “Woman of the Year” award. By focusing our energy on worshipping a show and creator so in cahoots with misogyny, we miss out on the real work of feminism in the arts: giving our energy and support to female creators who actually have the life experience to tell the stories about the blonde girl who doesn’t die in the alleyway. (I mean, I know it was the 90s, but why, oh why, did anyone think this man trying to craft a show about female empowerment was a good idea???)
Moving forward, I hope we think deeper and more critically about what we consume and identify as “feminist media,” and I hope we can respond to Buffy in a healthy, productive way — by building off of what it gave us and rejecting what it took.
And we can do it all without Joss Whedon.
Sam Auch is a writer, actor, and visual artists based in Brooklyn. She co-hosts a podcast called Revenge of the Final Girl which breaks down misogyny in sci-fi and fantasy.
