STFU Moffat

RE: Karen Gillan Choosing Amy’s Outfits

I actually think this is worse. Because Karen (very rightly) said that the vast majority of young women would wear short skirts or shorts with leggings or tights or boots. If you’re an attractive cis* woman of 20 or 21 then, yeah, that’s pretty much average girlwear. It makes total sense for Karen to have said, “Practically speaking, she’s a Scottish girl growing up in a small town and she’s young and hip and she works as a kiss-o-gram so she’s obviously not unaware of her sexuality or highly repressed about it so obviously this kind of attire makes sense.”

But then it feels like Moffat and Co. went, “Yes, yes, yes. Good idea. Short skirts. Amy should wear them. Good,” and have since made every effort to highlight that fact. To make her character rarely sexual on her on terms but rather sexualIZED by everyone around her, including by the viewer through both the script and the camera angles. We pan up and down Amy, we see her from above, from below, we view her lying down. We rarely pan up the Doctor’s suit legs or Rory’s jeans because why would they? They aren’t the objects of the show. They are subjects. The problem isn’t Karen’s very appropriate decision to dress at young woman like a young woman. The problem is how that decision has been taken advantage of.

[submitted by ohwhatatragiccost]

I think you sum up this issue really well. Because there isn’t anything wrong with the way that Amy dresses! Our problems stem from the way that she is treated and portrayed because of the way that she dresses, which, as you point out, is very different from the way that the major male characters are treated and portrayed. While the clothing worn by Rory and the Doctor definitely plays a role in the show, it’s framed in a very different way than the clothing Amy wears. For example, Rory’s t-shirt at his bachelor party could be seen as proof of his love for Amy. It’s cute and kind of silly, and part of his personality. Amy’s skirts, however, are repeatedly referenced as something that sexualizes her, and her body becomes a punchline.

-Z