Fleabag is Not a Femcel

Get a whole month of great cinema FREE on MUBI: mubi.com/broeydeschanel
Follow and support the channel!
Patreon: / broeydeschanel
Instagram: / broey_deschanel
Twitter: / deschanelbroey
Thumbnail by Hannah Raine:
/ hannahmraine
Rehash Podcast and Patreon:
anchor.fm/rehashpodcast
/ rehashpodcast
SOURCES:
Ameeriali, “The destructive force that is ‘dissociative feminism’” The Social Talks (2022).
Phoebe Waller-Bridge, “Fleabag: The Original Play” Playwrights Canada Press (2016).
Emmeline Clein, “The Smartest Women I Know Are All Dissociating” Buzzfeed News (2019).
Emma Garland, “Enter the Fleabag era: What does it mean to be a ‘dissociative feminist’?” Dazed (2022).
Helen Lewis, “The Nostalgic End of Fleabag: As the groundbreaking show concludes with a final theater run in London, audiences are left to grapple with its meaning” The Atlantic (2019).
Rebecca Liu, “The Making Of A Millennial Woman”, Another Gaze (2019).
Linda Nochlin, “Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists?” ARTnews (1971).
Sophia Peyser, “The “Fleabag” Era of Dissociative Feminism Must End” Lithium Magazine (2022).
Ayesha A. Siddiqi, “Memento Millenial” Substack (2022).

[@BroeyDeschanel]

this camera really looked and me and said, "I'm going to make her look like a distinguished 65-year old"

[@-topic9506]

"how dare a female writer portray their female characters as human beings instead of idealized symbols of revolutionary feminism?" is all I'm hearing from these critics

[@msr760]

Anytime a woman makes any art with genuine feeling (Fleabag, Phoebe Bridgers, Mitski, Fiona Apple, etc). other women treat it, and the women who made it, as not human. People literally refuse to see Phoebe, Mitski, and Fiona as anything but a part of the "sad girl" aesthetic which is just as dehumanizing as when men make art that refuses to see women as fully-fleshed out people. It's like they're so excited to see women portrayed as people they just go too far and make it into a ~thing~. Women can't just be human, they have to be part of a trend, subculture, or tik tok specific niche.

[@mrigashiradoe]

when my grandmother passed away in 2019 all i remember was that feeling fleabag had, "all the love i had for her, where can i put it now?". fleabag was just the average woman to me. i never understood the need to label her some "femcel". she was the modern woman, grieving, falling all over the place, and looking for connection. aren't we all?

[@oftinuvielskin9020]

One thing that did make me uncomfortable about Fleabag first was how she treated her ex - because the scene kind of comes down to her mocking him for not being masculine enough, and I just hate that trope in general, but he ends up easily finding somebody else, married with a baby. So the show does prove her wrong, and show how her treatment of him is more a reflection of her than him, but initially it is so easy to take her commentary straight and think the joke really is supposed to be on him.

[@CRUSH40GIRL]

its so tragic how EVERYTHING women do has to be boxed under a label or some kind of social commentary. We cant be sad and defeated without being called a "femcel dismissive feminist", we cant be aloof and purposefully airheaded without being accused of "propelling stereotypes and setting women back". EVERYTHING we do has to be some kind of feminist commentary and we cant just LIVE!

[@hotpinkinthenight]

as a woman of colour i find it frustrating when people use the whiteness of these characters as a reason to denigrate fleabag, rooney's works, etc. mainly because it feels very deflective. if they're tired of messy female characters being overwhelmingly white then maybe channelling efforts into reading and promoting messy female characters of colour, by authors of colour, would be more productive. either way it's something we should be doing regardless of how we feel about waller-bridge & rooney

[@hannahstanton5115]

I get so furious when people criticise fleabag for being “dissociative feminism.” Where did pwb say she was writing the feminist manifesto with fleabag?? Women can’t just produce art for self expression it seems, there has to be some kind of social motive, which in turn must be picked apart, because the only thing feminism seems to be doing these days is telling other feminists that they’re doing the wrong kind of feminism. Is any other movement held to such scrutiny?

[@jaman_jy]

these articles really jump right into the entire "women aren't allowed to be flawed" narrative without even realizing it and it is painful to watch.

[@PokhrajRoy.]

‘Fleabag’ was such a fun show and also beautifully written and most importantly, cleverly edited. I was sad to see people use it as a vehicle for questionable behaviour.

[@thegreenworld6440]

There is something so broken in the way people conflate "protagonist" with "hero" and assume that if a character commits some kind of harmful action the audience is supposed to emulate that action.

[@quantumlandbooks4005]

People don't want real feminism. They want perfect performances of feminism and everything that doesn't hold up to their level of perfection is consequently evil.

[@thomashester2]

Yeah I feel the misinterpretation also reminds me of people misassigning Zoey Deschannel’s character in 500 days of Summer as a MPDG like it’s not a demantaling of the trope

[@supposedlymel]

I think the reason why Fleabag, as well as her season of Killing Eve were so successful, is because, like you said, they don't have overtly sociological storylines. Just because the leads are women does not mean we have to examine all the aspects of them being a woman in society. They just exist. I know a lot of queer women felt that way as well with killing eve; you had these two queer female leads just existing, and it was like a breath of fresh air. And the same with Fleabag. She is a woman who is suffering from numerous emotional moments throughout her life, just as any male character would.

[@kathleen2268]

I feel like Michaela Coel is another female millennial writer who has made some incredible work. Chewing Gum is hysterical and I May Destroy You was for me capital g Great

[@athenajaxon2397]

Honestly female written and directed media gets such an insane amount of criticism and even when it's praised eventually there's a backlash to it

[@xx___x]

I feel like anyone who accuses Flesbag as disassociating as something related to being a bad feminist has obviously never been depressed and trying their damn hardest not to have a mental breakdown.

[@henrye3935]

Modern cinema and TV often seem to think that empowerment is writing someone who's infallible and good at everything. They write characters who start the story correct, travel through it correct, and by the end have proven they're correct.

[@WelfareChrist]

I’ve worked on and off in hospice care for nearing a decade now. By far the best way I’ve found to deal with loss and grief is something that was brought up in this video, it’s gratitude. Focusing on being grateful for the time you had with the person even when it was barely any at all, it doesn’t mean losing them doesn’t hurt but it shifts the focus from pain to gratitude and from what you’re experiencing to what they meant to you. And that, that private celebration of the joy another brought to your life, it can’t be taken or lost but only given up. So while gratitude might not stop the hurt of losing someone, I think it does a lot to strengthen us to face that hurt and not run from it.

[@lilygreenall2837]

Honestly, these articles come across like women dragging other women for making nuanced art. It's probably not how it's meant, but requiring characters to fully represent social ideologies, like feminism or marxism, ends up stripping these characters of their personal identities, which is really their strength.