Can we please collectively move on...
It's 2019 and people are still out here treating the white girl with a sword trope as this new, daring, groundbreaking feminist concept.
Tolkien did it in 1954 with Eowyn.
Tamora Pierce did it in 1983 with Alanna.
Robin McKinley did it in 1984 with Aerin.
And here we are in 2019 still pushing this narrative that writers like sj/m are so brave and revolutionary for having characters like Ae/lin.
Don't get me wrong I love Alanna, Eowyn and Aerin, but it's genuinely amusing (by which I mean infuriating) to me that today's booktubers keep praising these stories into the heavens as if in 2019 cishet white author are still taking a risk when they give their cishet white female heroines a sword and, even more groundbreaking, let them like giRly things at the same time.
Like I'm not saying there's something inherently wrong with that type of story, but if the media and booktubers cream their jeans everytime a book like that publishes, and act like this is the epitome of what a feminist fantasy story should look like (while stubbornly disregarding all the stories with sword-loving protagonists that don't fit into your typical YA mold: badass characters who are lgbtq, protags with disabilities who still kick some serious ass, fearless warrior heroines who are also characters of color), then I'm afraid we'll be stuck in this particular swamp for another 50 years.


















