The Bechdel Test

[Tsukiyumi]

“The audience doesn’t want to listen to a bunch of women talking about whatever it is women talk about.”

Mystery solved.

[stitch626]

“The audience doesn’t want to listen to a bunch of women talking about whatever it is women talk about.”

Mystery solved.

Maybe the problem is that women talk about really weird/boring stuff, which wouldn't make decent films.



I don't know, just trying to make up something other than the old standbys.

So... if two female characters are talking about another character who happens to be male (lets say he robbed a bank and thats what they are talking about), then does the movie fail? Because if so this test fails itself, by removing natural conversation and forcing unnatural conversation upon female characters (another form of stereotyping).

[Tsukiyumi]

Maybe the problem is that women talk about really weird/boring stuff, which wouldn't make decent films.

"So, Martha, do you ever feel... less than fresh?"

[Teaos]

Then one of them laughs and wets her self.

[Atekimogus]

Then it would fail the test. Like I said before, the point is not that an individual movie is bad for failing the test or good for passing it. The point is that large numbers of movies fail it, but virtually none would ever fail the male version.

Well of course not, those movies are geared towards a male audience. That's like faulting a ferrari for not having enough luggage space and child seats.

But how many times do you remember Beverly and Troi actually talking to one another about anything at all? I like to think I have a good knowledge of TNG and I can think of only two examples off the top of my head - The Price, where they exercised together and had a lengthy conversation about Troi's new love interest, and The Host, where they sit in 10 Forward and have a conversation about Crusher's Trill boyfriend. Perhaps there were others along the way, but I certainly don't remember any. Do you?

And what would they even talk about, really? I could list you a dozen interests and hobbies Picard had, and a bunch Riker had, and a bunch Data had. But in 170 episodes can you name me even ONE thing we ever learned about Beverly Crusher that didn't relate to how she felt about dead hubby Jack, or son Wesley, or unrequited not-quite-crush Picard?

True enough, I think in TNG the women were treated very poorly. But again, the show was geared - I daresay - towards a mostly male audience. Lame excuse but there you have it.

From an inuniverse point of view.....what the F would they talk about? Their area of expertise do not really overlap. If one is injured call Crusher, if you have a nutjob, call Troi. Now having lenghty conversation between Crusher and Troi regarding a crewmember with an alien mumbo-jumbo virus altering his psych is the medicinal equivalent of techno-babble....nothing much lost imho.

That leaves private conversation. Crusher is a mother. The likelihood that their converstaion will involve their child is quite high. BOOM, her child happens to be a male...failed test. Ignoring her child...two woman are chatting. Again the likelyhood that their conversation will indeed involve a male is so high......is it sexiest if it's true? Romance is quite important to most women and if they are straight..of course they'll talk about their boyfriends....BOOM...failed test.

Now if Troi would have been the helmsman (helmwoman?) and Crusher the tactical officer they surley would have more interaction. (For about 5 minutes before crushing into the next celestial object. )

You sometimes have conversations with women about men and women, and sometimes with men about women and men. But in movies that doesn't happen. Or at least, it only happens rarely. In movies one particular type of interaction is largely absent. And this is NOT a result of random chance. This is on purpose.

That is because my life isn't limited to 3 persons and 90 minutes. If you wan't to fulfill this test you more or less have to fabricate the whole situation because it rarly would come natural.

For example....we know Joss Whedon. He is a fan of strong women in all his works and I think noone could call him a sexiest. Look at the new avengers movie. Now surley we have two women in there (hill and romanov) who got cast mainly for their looks but are they treated unfairly? Quite the contrary. Hill gets an amazing car chasing scene in the beginning of the movie and is basically in charge of the helicarrier-thing. Romanov is quite important to the plot and despite having no super-power at all holds up quite well against all the others.

Yet..for some reason there was no interaction between those two...it just didn't flow naturally....so it fails this test. Now again, Avengers is geared - I daresay - mostly for a male audience and yet it treats women imho quite fairly...still a fail if you consider this test. Yet if they insisted on having a professional conversation between the two not regarding the rest of the male cast.......wouldn't it look completely out of place and forced?


Now I daresay if they make a movie from women for women the chances are still quite high that they would fail this test.

[Praeothmin]

But how many times do you remember Beverly and Troi actually talking to one another about anything at all?

"And have you noticed how your boobs have started to firm up?"
"Not that we care about such things in this day and age!"

[Tholian_Avenger]

From an inuniverse point of view.....what the F would they talk about? Their area of expertise do not really overlap. If one is injured call Crusher, if you have a nutjob, call Troi. Now having lenghty conversation between Crusher and Troi regarding a crewmember with an alien mumbo-jumbo virus altering his psych is the medicinal equivalent of techno-babble....nothing much lost imho.

You can't think of any reason that a medical doctor and a psychologist might need to speak to each other in a professional manner?

[Atekimogus]

Depends I guess. In my experience those two areas do not overlap.....at all. Maybe in same other countries where a more holistic approach to medicine is practiced those might overlap more.

That being said, even if they frequently have to discuss diagnoses for some crewmembers I struggle to think of anything interesting those two could share with the audience considering the setting of the series. "Crewmen XY has catched a cardassian fungi causing parts of his you know what to fall off and now he suffers from depression, I booked a few sessions for him with you" "Sure thing Bevery!"

Oh wait....I just failed the test seeing that the patient is a male.......scratch that. Make it a woman growing a beard, yeah that's better.


Now I am not saying it cannot be done I am just saying that for two members of the bridgecrew to have a professional discussion would come more naturally. I guess Yaneway and Seven would pass the Bechel test several times but again I DO think this has more to do with their characters respective lives overlapping more in a professional way than the writers trying especially hard to be not sexiest (as can be evidenced by sevens outfits.)

And if the lives of the women in the cast do not overlap in such a way, trying to satisfy the bechdel test just for the sake of it would be a failure.

[Captain Seafort]

But how many times do you remember Beverly and Troi actually talking to one another about anything at all? I like to think I have a good knowledge of TNG and I can think of only two examples off the top of my head - The Price, where they exercised together and had a lengthy conversation about Troi's new love interest, and The Host, where they sit in 10 Forward and have a conversation about Crusher's Trill boyfriend. Perhaps there were others along the way, but I certainly don't remember any. Do you?

The Loss: discussing Troi's brain damage
Thine Own Self: discussing Beverly commanding the ship

There was also a few others-
Descent: Beverly and the sprog discuss about throwing bits of star at the Borg
Lower Decks: a few work-related discussions between Beverly and Ogawa and Ogawa and Sito.

[stitch626]

Ok aside from me disliking this test as I see it as pointless...

Does a movie fail if there is at least 1 conversation about a male between 2 females, or is it that if thats the only thing they talk about?

[IanKennedy]

Ok aside from me disliking this test as I see it as pointless...

Does a movie fail if there is at least 1 conversation about a male between 2 females, or is it that if thats the only thing they talk about?

Clearly not the tests are:

The test is three simple questions. You pass if you can answer all three with a yes :

1) Does the work contain two or more female characters significant enough to have names?
2) Do they talk to one another at any point?
3) Is the conversation about something other than a man?

The issue is not that they shouldn't talk about men, but, that they must talk about something else at some point.

[stitch626]

Ah I see, well that significantly increases the number of passes.


I now have a desire to watch old black and white films and see how many of the old ones pass or fail.

[Graham Kennedy]

I can't be bothered to go through quoting different posts from a bunch of people properly, so I'll just do some random thoughts to random quotes...

"Well of course not, those movies are geared towards a male audience. That's like faulting a ferrari for not having enough luggage space and child seats."

That's kind of the point. The presumption of this sentiment is that men are only interested in men; that they specifically do not want to see women talking to one another, ever, unless the conversation is about men. That is not a good thing, in my view.

"That leaves private conversation. Crusher is a mother. The likelihood that their converstaion will involve their child is quite high. BOOM, her child happens to be a male...failed test. Ignoring her child...two woman are chatting. Again the likelyhood that their conversation will indeed involve a male is so high."

Sisko was a father, but whilst he had plenty of conversations about Jake he also had plenty that were not.

"is it sexiest if it's true?"

As I've said repeatedly, no it isn't.

"Romance is quite important to most women and if they are straight..of course they'll talk about their boyfriends....BOOM...failed test."

Not unless romance and boyfriends and such is the ONLY thing they ever talk about, no. Again, look at the converse - romance is quite important to men, too, and so of course they will talk about their wives or girlfriends. O'Brien talked about Keiko often enough. But he also talked about other things, frequently.

"If you wan't to fulfill this test you more or less have to fabricate the whole situation because it rarly would come natural."

You're suggesting that women don't naturally talk to one another about anything but men. Really?

"For example....we know Joss Whedon. He is a fan of strong women in all his works and I think noone could call him a sexiest."

Actually a lot of people do. But anyway...

"Look at the new avengers movie. Now surley we have two women in there (hill and romanov) who got cast mainly for their looks but are they treated unfairly? Quite the contrary. Hill gets an amazing car chasing scene in the beginning of the movie and is basically in charge of the helicarrier-thing. Romanov is quite important to the plot and despite having no super-power at all holds up quite well against all the others.

Yet..for some reason there was no interaction between those two...it just didn't flow naturally....so it fails this test. Now again, Avengers is geared - I daresay - mostly for a male audience and yet it treats women imho quite fairly...still a fail if you consider this test. Yet if they insisted on having a professional conversation between the two not regarding the rest of the male cast.......wouldn't it look completely out of place and forced?"

I don't know. Where the conversations between the males that were not about women forced and out of place?

Again, this is kind of the point. You're basically complaining that, given the characters and situations in that film, it would be awkward to have a conversation between those two women. Yes, agreed. If I were suggesting that such conversations should be simply forced in regardless of the story, it would be absurd. But I'm not - rather, I'm posing the question of why it is that the large majority of films are deliberately written in a way that it would be awkward for the women - if there are any - to have any kind of relationship with one another, even if that relationship advances the plot.

[Atekimogus]

"Well of course not, those movies are geared towards a male audience. That's like faulting a ferrari for not having enough luggage space and child seats."

That's kind of the point. The presumption of this sentiment is that men are only interested in men; that they specifically do not want to see women talking to one another, ever, unless the conversation is about men. That is not a good thing, in my view.

Again, this is kind of the point. You're basically complaining that, given the characters and situations in that film, it would be awkward to have a conversation between those two women. Yes, agreed. If I were suggesting that such conversations should be simply forced in regardless of the story, it would be absurd. But I'm not - rather, I'm posing the question of why it is that the large majority of films are deliberately written in a way that it would be awkward for the women - if there are any - to have any kind of relationship with one another, even if that relationship advances the plot.

That is - again - because the large majority of those movies are written largely for a male audience in the 14-30 years age slot. (And let's not get all high and mighty, a horny teenager is indeed more interested in cup-sizes than in women discussion stuff, I make no excuses). That means that the main hero is by default a male, someone the male-audience can identify with. Now from there on out it's already hard to fit in two women talking about stuff unrelated to the main-character. (Oh, if just Luke would have been a Lucy Skywalker...Star Wars would surley have passed the test and now I can certainly see the appeal of certain...scenes with two hot twins, however as child/teenager......main hero is a girl? Not so interested, sorry. Am I supposed to appologize for liking beautiful women and being able to identify more with members of my own sex? I have a young niece who recently watched Rapunzel and somehow she seems to identify more with Rapunzel than with Flinn Rider. What is wrong with her?)

That is my point really, if you have a movie with a 80% male cast it's quite easy to fail this test no matter how respectful and equal women are treated in it. That is were this test fails, if you pass or fail it largely depends on the percentage of male/female cast-members and NOT on if women are treated fair and equal.

So my main gripe with the Bechdel test is that is far to strict, it shouldn't be only just two women having a meaningful conversation about a topic but a woman talking to a man about something which advances the story (EVEN if it's about a man) should also pass the test, you know as a benchmark if women are just there for eyecandy (and what is wrong with THAT?) or not. That is why it sounds - to me - like some feminazi bullshit to be honest, because you fail the test as soon as either a male is spoken to or spoken about.

But let's have a look at a recent movie made for women. Example "Bridesmaids". It surley passes the bechdel test but -apart from being just a plain unfunny movie (imho)- does it depect women in a good, respectful way? Not really, they are selfish, mean, gross, self-centered bitches all of them, there isn't a single likeable character in it. Or let's examine a few porns with a largely female cast. I am sure it would be amusing how many of those actually pass the bechdel test.

[IanKennedy]

"Well of course not, those movies are geared towards a male audience. That's like faulting a ferrari for not having enough luggage space and child seats."

That's kind of the point. The presumption of this sentiment is that men are only interested in men; that they specifically do not want to see women talking to one another, ever, unless the conversation is about men. That is not a good thing, in my view.

Again, this is kind of the point. You're basically complaining that, given the characters and situations in that film, it would be awkward to have a conversation between those two women. Yes, agreed. If I were suggesting that such conversations should be simply forced in regardless of the story, it would be absurd. But I'm not - rather, I'm posing the question of why it is that the large majority of films are deliberately written in a way that it would be awkward for the women - if there are any - to have any kind of relationship with one another, even if that relationship advances the plot.

That is - again - because the large majority of those movies are written largely for a male audience in the 14-30 years age slot. (And let's not get all high and mighty, a horny teenager is indeed more interested in cup-sizes than in women discussion stuff, I make no excuses). That means that the main hero is by default a male, someone the male-audience can identify with. Now from there on out it's already hard to fit in two women talking about stuff unrelated to the main-character. (Oh, if just Luke would have been a Lucy Skywalker...Star Wars would surley have passed the test and now I can certainly see the appeal of certain...scenes with two hot twins, however as child/teenager......main hero is a girl? Not so interested, sorry. Am I supposed to appologize for liking beautiful women and being able to identify more with members of my own sex? I have a young niece who recently watched Rapunzel and somehow she seems to identify more with Rapunzel than with Flinn Rider. What is wrong with her?)

That is my point really, if you have a movie with a 80% male cast it's quite easy to fail this test no matter how respectful and equal women are treated in it. That is were this test fails, if you pass or fail it largely depends on the percentage of male/female cast-members and NOT on if women are treated fair and equal.

So my main gripe with the Bechdel test is that is far to strict, it shouldn't be only just two women having a meaningful conversation about a topic but a woman talking to a man about something which advances the story (EVEN if it's about a man) should also pass the test, you know as a benchmark if women are just there for eyecandy (and what is wrong with THAT?) or not. That is why it sounds - to me - like some feminazi bullshit to be honest, because you fail the test as soon as either a male is spoken to or spoken about.

But let's have a look at a recent movie made for women. Example "Bridesmaids". It surley passes the bechdel test but -apart from being just a plain unfunny movie (imho)- does it depect women in a good, respectful way? Not really, they are selfish, mean, gross, self-centered bitches all of them, there isn't a single likeable character in it. Or let's examine a few porns with a largely female cast. I am sure it would be amusing how many of those actually pass the bechdel test.

No, that's completely wrong. First it's not a measure of sexism, but more a measure of if there are decent female characters in the film. As Graham has said many times a film that passes the test is not suggesting that that film is less sexist than one that doesn't. All a film needs to pass is that there are two women in the film and that at some point they have a conversation about something other than how much they fancy men.

Take Alien, for example. There are two women in the film and they have names and they also do talk to each other. When they do they don't talk about how much they fancy the captain, instead they talk about things related to the plot. It could be argued that Alien is very much aimed at a male audience, after all it's a scifi film and one could argue that it's a horror movie. Traditionally a male class of films.

Once again, lets stress that you do not fail the test if two females talk about a male, only if that's all they ever talk about. Ready the questions and stop twisting them to suit your point of view.

1) Does the work contain two or more female characters significant enough to have names?
2) Do they talk to one another at any point?
3) Is the conversation about something other than a man?