Hey kids, let's talk about the male gaze!

[Good Guy Garlan]

I can't be the only one who's got a big problem with this in the series, right? Even though we have lots of female POVs, the female gaze-to-male gaze ratio is completely skewed towards the latter. 

Let's take Cersei's and Dany's random girl-on-girl sex scenes to begin with. While Cersei's tryst with Taena does some things for the former's character development, it really doesn't tell us anything we don't already know about Cersei: she does have an unhealthy amount of penis envy and internalized misogyny, and she constantly casts herself in Robert's role, often with poor results. 

Ok, whatever, that's not as ridiculous as Dany having sex with Irri out of absolutely nowhere. There was no set up to that, and it had literally no implications or consequences for character or plot. None at all. What did that contribute to the plot or Dany's (or Irri's) character development, I ask you? 

On the other hand, we have Jon Connington, who, in case you haven't kept up with GRRM's Con appearances, you might be surprised to know is gay. And that's the thing. George goes all out with the male gaze: graphic lesbian sex out of the blue for no reason at all, nipples hard as diamonds, wet Myrish swamps (!), etc. And yet, everything gay about Jon Connington is as subtle as walking on egg shells. The reader has to infer it, because god forbid we see two men and at least one penis in a series where female characters act out of character to headline little titillating interludes.

Jon Connington is gay (I mean, I think. He did talk to Rhaegar that one time and the two of them were alone in a rooftop, so that's gotta do), he's got a POV, and yet we never get the tiniest hint of his sex life. He's totally asexual. His sex life is even more subtle than Dumbledore's. Oh, but you know who we do see having gay sex? Dany...for some reason. It makes no sense. 

Let's take the infamous Arys chapter. What on god's green Earth is the point of that chapter other than showing us a sex scene from the most obvious male gaze ever? Yet I'm not sure Arianne's huge and responsive nipples are that important for the plot that GRRM had to create a POV from scratch just to describe them. Who knows, maybe Azor Ahai is hiding somewhere around those gigantic nipples. 

And look at Asha's sex scene with Qarl the Maid. She might as well have been pleasuring herself while Qarl ate a sandwich and watched from the corner, for all his involvement in the proceedings. It's Asha's POV and she thinks more about her vagina (which is also the world, somehow? But hey, it's a fantasy series, who am I to judge) than the guy she's banging. I literally have no idea what Qarl or Arys look like, but ask me about the exact texture and radius of Arianne's nipples and class is in session. 

Oh sure, Tyrion's penis is described in all its detailed glory, but remarkably that scene isn't meant to be titillating or arousing or even sexual. GRRM has no problem describing old or wrinkly or fat male bodies, but when it comes to attractive dudes or erotic contexts things get weirdly sedated. Look at the vague language he uses when describing Jaime in a bath: "He looked like half a corpse and half a god." Stop it, George, I'm fanning myself already, you provocateur! And yet Cersei stands up from a tub and the gaze lingers for what seems like hours on her pubic hairs, her breasts, etc. 

My point is that the depiction of male and female bodies in the series is severely disproportionate, both in number and in manner of description. And look, I get it, not every straight author is gonna be comfortable writing gay sex scenes or even homoerotical moments (though writers like Michael Chabon and Neil Gaiman managed to do it just fine), but stuff like this does detract from generally well-written female and LGBT characters, in my humble opinion. 

 

[The Mountain That Flies]

Just because GRRM is a progressive writer does not make him perfect at balancing all aspects of human sexuality in his works. If I had to guess I would say being a heterosexual, cis-gendered guy makes writing with the gaze you described more natural for him. While he does try the push outside of his comfort zone on sex, it's simply not as a big a strength for him as it is for Chabon and Gaiman, which is fine because there are areas of world building where he is superior to both of them. It's also fine for you (and I) to want more nuanced depictions of the sexual spectrum in fantasy works, but to quote one of the author's you adore, GRRM is not your bitch. 

Oh, and Connington doesn't think openly gay thoughts because he's repressed. Does he explicitly say he's repressed? No, I inferred it through understanding what an unreliable narrator is.

[Ferocious Veldt Roarer]

OK, just for the shits and giggles, I'm going play the devil's advocate. To a degree, because I can't say you're actually wrong, considering the big picture.

As for Arys: it revealed the motivation for his treason, which was lust-that-he-mistook-for-love. So the author showed, or attempted to show, lust. Hence nipples. If the scene read a little like porn, I won't say that, in that particular scene, it was wrong. Lust should look like porn.

As for the Myrish Swamp: first, squick! But it also did demonstrate, from close up, some facets of Cersei. And if we didn't learn anything actually new new there, the same can be told about a lot of her POV content. And had she, before the Myrish Swamp, ever actually said aloud that her life would've been perfectly perfect if not for the lack of a penis?

As for Dany and Irri... OK, in the words of Lt. Dick Winters, "No excuse" (strange as it looks, I've only very recently discovered the "Band of Brothers"). That's what TV Tropes call a "Big Lipped Alligator Moment", checking all the boxes: appears out of nowhere, strange in context, and never goes anywhere. Here, it's a lesbian alligator.

BTW, the Gay - Lesbian Asymmetry is twofold: on one hand, GRRM will insert a detailed scene of two chicks doing it, while he won't do the same with two dudes. On the other hand, there's no lesbian characters of importance (no, Dany isn't, and neither is Cersei), while Loras - Renly weighed heavily on the plot. Yes, it was more hinted that shown ("wait, they were gay?" is something that many a reader have thought), it's also of the "once you've seen it, it cannot be unseen" variety (kind of like R + L = J, actually).

[Good Guy Garlan]

1 hour ago, The Mountain That Flies said:

but to quote one of the author's you adore, GRRM is not your bitch. 

*Sigh*

1 hour ago, The Mountain That Flies said:

Oh, and Connington doesn't think openly gay thoughts because he's repressed. Does he explicitly say he's repressed? No, I inferred it through understanding what an unreliable narrator is.

That's hella convenient, that the one gay POV just so happens to be repressed. It's almost as if the author doesn't wanna write a gay sex scene (which is fine, he has the right to write whatever he wants, just as I have the right to criticize and comment on his writing).

1 hour ago, Ferocious Veldt Roarer said:

OK, just for the shits and giggles, I'm going play the devil's advocate. To a degree, because I can't say you're actually wrong, considering the big picture.

As for Arys: it revealed the motivation for his treason, which was lust-that-he-mistook-for-love. So the author showed, or attempted to show, lust. Hence nipples. If the scene read a little like porn, I won't say that, in that particular scene, it was wrong. Lust should look like porn.

As for the Myrish Swamp: first, squick! But it also did demonstrate, from close up, some facets of Cersei. And if we didn't learn anything actually new new there, the same can be told about a lot of her POV content. And had she, before the Myrish Swamp, ever actually said aloud that her life would've been perfectly perfect if not for the lack of a penis?

As for Dany and Irri... OK, in the words of Lt. Dick Winters, "No excuse" (strange as it looks, I've only very recently discovered the "Band of Brothers"). That's what TV Tropes call a "Big Lipped Alligator Moment", checking all the boxes: appears out of nowhere, strange in context, and never goes anywhere. Here, it's a lesbian alligator.

BTW, the Gay - Lesbian Asymmetry is twofold: on one hand, GRRM will insert a detailed scene of two chicks doing it, while he won't do the same with two dudes. On the other hand, there's no lesbian characters of importance (no, Dany isn't, and neither is Cersei), while Loras - Renly weighed heavily on the plot. Yes, it was more hinted that shown ("wait, they were gay?" is something that many a reader have thought), it's also of the "once you've seen it, it cannot be unseen" variety (kind of like R + L = J, actually).

My gripe with the Arys chapter is that the exact same thing could've been told from Arianne's POV and nothing of value would be lost. Although I think the dialogue would have been a tad forced, like "Oh, Arys, don't stop sucking on my gigantic and responsive nipples!" 

I think I remember Cersei saying that about her not being a man before the Taena thing. I don't totally hate that scene, but it was kinda jarring and needlessly over the top.

That's a good point about lesbian characters don't being as important as gay or bi male characters, but a part of me wonders like what's the point of making a POV character gay if you're gonna keep that side of him super subtle. Which would be totally fine if the series treated other types of sexualities just as subtle, but it doesn't. 

 

[The Ned's Little Girl]

@Good Guy Garlan I very much agree with your points and would add that another drawback in my opinion is that GRRM spends way too much time and effort detailing ad nauseum the physical imperfections of female characters. Like, do we really need that many jokes about Selyse's mustache, or reminders of Lollys Stokeworth's bovine expression? Seriously, we can grasp the point faster than that.

 

[CornishDornish]

2 hours ago, Good Guy Garlan said:

And yet, everything gay about Jon Connington is as subtle as walking on egg shells. The reader has to infer it, because god forbid we see two men and at least one penis in a series where female characters act out of character to headline little titillating interludes

It might be because even the faintest whiff of bi/homosexuality in men is not tolerated in Westeros.

[David Selig]

12 minutes ago, CornishDornish said:

It might be because even the faintest whiff of bi/homosexuality in men is not tolerated in Westeros.

So the guy is careful not the give himself away to mindreaders?

[Philokles]

I liked the subtlety in Loras and Renly's relationship, how even among several of the characters it was an open secret, but you cannot get away with it when a character is a POV. Overall, I'd rather get rid of the superfluous sex scenes altogether than add more to be representative.

[Ferocious Veldt Roarer]

1 hour ago, Good Guy Garlan said:

My gripe with the Arys chapter is that the exact same thing could've been told from Arianne's POV and nothing of value would be lost. Although I think the dialogue would have been a tad forced, like "Oh, Arys, don't stop sucking on my gigantic and responsive nipples!" 

Could be. OTOH, the chapter wasn't only about coitus. There could be numerous reasons why the author decided it worked better from Arys' POV. And, seriously, "I must do whatever she says, she's so beautiful" sounds so much better than "He must to whatever I say, I'm so beautiful".

1 hour ago, Good Guy Garlan said:

I think I remember Cersei saying that about her not being a man before the Taena thing. I don't totally hate that scene, but it was kinda jarring and needlessly over the top.

That, sure. But so literal? I don't think so.

[CornishDornish]

14 minutes ago, David Selig said:

So the guy is careful not the give himself away to mindreaders?

Point taken although your comment is unintentionally hilarious as the series is set in a world with powerful psychic-based magic written by an sci-fi author.

Anyway...back to the topic GRRM has actually answered the OP original point about the male gaze.

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/aug/11/george-rr-martin-game-of-thrones-gay-sex
http://www.pinknews.co.uk/2014/08/12/game-of-thrones-author-i-wont-include-gay-characters-in-novels-for-the-sake-of-it/

In which he says this..

Quote

He told the crowd that “limitations” prevent him from including homosexuality, because all his chapters are written from the perspective of central characters, none of whom are gay.

He said: “Frankly, it is the way I prefer to write fiction because that is the way all of us experience life.

“You’re seeing me from your viewpoint, you’re not seeing what someone over here is seeing.

“Will that change? It might. I’ve had letters from fans who want me to present particularly an explicit male sex scene – most of the letters come from women.

“I’m not going to do it just for the sake of doing it. If the plot lends itself to that, if one of my viewpoint characters is in a situation, then I’m not going to shy away from it, but you can’t just insert things because everyone wants to see them.

Well there you have it. He has a male gaze because....he is a male heterosexual, and he's honest about what he's comfortable and not comfortable writing about. But he's also open to the possibility of there being a gay sex scene. Watch this space.

[aryagonnakill#2]

It is my understanding that women are much more likely to be bi sexual than men, and that many young women experiment with such things.

[Jon Ice-Eyes]

There's a quote that gets passed around articles on The George and gender, from a female (Dany or Arianne, I forget) POV, where the subject of a sentence describing her clothes is 'her breasts.' It is truly laughable. Something along the lines of, "Her breasts were free under a blue silk tunic." So bad. 

George is a pretty firm advocate for women... on like 40 year old terms. His feminism is showing that women can be powerful personalities and break gender roles.  Cool, that's actually valuable! But feminism goes WAY beyond that now. I get it, he's 60, he hasn't kept up with the times. Nor is it his obligation. We take what we can get. But not without comment. 

Honestly, I find that he is a bad writer of women. My wife and all my female friends inform me that the ladies' POVs are not very accurate, and found female characters were either mentally identical to men (Dany, Arya) or else superhumanly stupid and/or insane (Cersei, Catelyn).  

And the talk about rape all the time. It goes beyond so-called 'gritty realism,' or even showing how bad it could be for women, and strays into fetishism. Probably not conscious. 

So yeah. It's a giant male gaze-off. As he pretty much admits. We love his books for their other virtues, in spite of their many obvious flaws. 

[BricksAndSparrows]

3 hours ago, Good Guy Garlan said:

Oh sure, Tyrion's penis is described in all its detailed glory, but remarkably that scene isn't meant to be titillating or arousing or even sexual. GRRM has no problem describing old or wrinkly or fat male bodies, but when it comes to attractive dudes or erotic contexts things get weirdly sedated.

 

What about Drogo?

[Good Guy Garlan]

15 minutes ago, CornishDornish said:

Point taken although your comment is unintentionally hilarious as the series is set in a world with powerful psychic-based magic written by an sci-fi author.

Anyway...back to the topic GRRM has actually answered the OP original point about the male gaze.

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/aug/11/george-rr-martin-game-of-thrones-gay-sex
http://www.pinknews.co.uk/2014/08/12/game-of-thrones-author-i-wont-include-gay-characters-in-novels-for-the-sake-of-it/

In which he says this..

Well there you have it. He has a male gaze because....he is a male heterosexual, and he's honest about what he's comfortable and not comfortable writing about. But he's also open to the possibility of there being a gay sex scene. Watch this space.

Sure, I get that, I mentioned that in the OP. It's just funny to me that the plot never lends itself to have a gay scene but it goes out of its way - even against how characters usually act - to have lesbian intercourse. Pretty convenient, seems to me. 

(Again, I'm not asking why GRRM writes solely from the perspective of a male gaze, but to what extent it affects the novels and especially how the audience views the female characters.)

11 minutes ago, Jon Ice-Eyes said:

There's a quote that gets passed around articles on The George and gender, from a female (Dany or Arianne, I forget) POV, where the subject of a sentence describing her clothes is 'her breasts.' It is truly laughable. Something along the lines of, "Her breasts were free under a blue silk tunic." So bad. 

George is a pretty firm advocate for women... on like 40 year old terms. His feminism is showing that women can be powerful personalities and break gender roles.  Cool, that's actually valuable! But feminism goes WAY beyond that now. I get it, he's 60, he hasn't kept up with the times. Nor is it his obligation. We take what we can get. But not without comment. 

Honestly, I find that he is a bad writer of women. My wife and all my female friends inform me that the ladies' POVs are not very accurate, and found female characters were either mentally identical to men (Dany, Arya) or else superhumanly stupid and/or insane (Cersei, Catelyn).  

And the talk about rape all the time. It goes beyond so-called 'gritty realism,' or even showing how bad it could be for women, and strays into fetishism. Probably not conscious. 

So yeah. It's a giant male gaze-off. As he pretty much admits. We love his books for their other virtues, in spite of their many obvious flaws. 

This post is on point, I totally agree. 

18 minutes ago, aryagonnakill#2 said:

It is my understanding that women are much more likely to be bi sexual than men, and that many young women experiment with such things.

Hmmm, what's your source on that? Mtv circa 2003? 

10 minutes ago, BricksAndSparrows said:

What about Drogo?

Considering the highly problematic context of his relationship with Dany, I'm not even sure what was GRRM's aim with that. Even if we ignore the obvious rape going on, I wouldn't say those bits are meant to be alluring or erotic or non-male gaze-y. 

[Orphalesion]

45 minutes ago, Ferocious Veldt Roarer said:

 And, seriously, "I must do whatever she says, she's so beautiful" sounds so much better than "He must to whatever I say, I'm so beautiful".

No not really. The former sounds like "typical guy with blueballs" the latter sounds like "I'm in charge, and I know it"

So imho the chapter would have actually worked better from Arianne's POV and Dorne would have had less of its weird "random POV roulette"

I'd rather get a look into the mind of a smart character manipulating a stupid one than into the mind of a stupid character getting manipulated.

[David Selig]

8 minutes ago, Good Guy Garlan said:

Hmmm, what's your source on that? Mtv circa 2003?

My guess is "porn".

[Traverys]

Lmao at the Myrish Swamp reference. That metaphor always evokes uncomfortable laughter from me.

I have pondered this quite a bit, and have grown used to this kind of thing. Science Fiction and Fantasy as a genre largely comprised of straight, heterosexual men.

Though I think the Daenerys and Cersei lesbian scenes are innately biased and gratuitous, I can at least say Cersei's had implications for her character. She was emulating Robert and being a man, or at least a man as how she perceives it. There's a common myth in culture that women's sexuality is more fluid than men's, but, looking back to the Greeks, it's more likely that cultural norms set those boundaries.

So yes, the constant imagery referring to women and their parts makes me roll my eyes every time. I think GRRM does a good job putting himself in the shoes of women as far as context and roles go, but sexuality is a limitation in his writing. He's not flawless. I find that female authors give a better balance between the two types of imagery in their writing, and tend to be the most likely to overtly include sex involving more than one male.

I think it also could be argued that there is a fear by publishers and authors of alienating readers by getting too graphic in male anatomy or gay sex, but I personally couldn't type that out without rolling my eyes right out of my head.

Oh and lets not forget how many times we have to read about sweat dripping between Daenery's breasts. Why that always has to mentioned instead of her back or legs or arms I'll never know.

[rotting sea cow]

You have a good point @Good Guy Garlan  

However, overall GRRM is not good at writing sex scenes. The only one I found slightly arousing was Shae mouth described as tasting of cloves and honey. The rest of them are for some adolescent comedy.

[Tianzi]

26 minutes ago, Good Guy Garlan said:

40 minutes ago, BricksAndSparrows said:

What about Drogo?

Considering the highly problematic context of his relationship with Dany, I'm not even sure what was GRRM's aim with that.

I think sooner Dany/Drogo was supposed to be fanservice, than Cersei/Taena.

I don't disagree with your point, but there are some explanations for that: JonCon, as someone's mentioned, is repressed (wonder why we've never got anywhere close to Loras/Renly...) and women are groomed to cultivate MODESTY, so maidens like Sansa won't go further than fantasising about caressing Loras' skin. I think that Dany doing her teenage sexuality discoveries with a girl is perfectly plausible and I don't have a problem with that being shown, but then let us see more of her lusting after men, shall we? Catelyn thinks about MAKING BABIES, and I can see why we get Cersei/Taena and not Cersei/Kettleblack, as it was the former she put more emotion into. But I agree we should get something more from Asha or Arianne. Cersei and Jaime flashback from Cersei's point of view could also be interesting, though I suspect she would focus less on his masculine beauty and more on his resemblance to herself.

PS. Sansa, being a walking Hot or Not scope, also should get some quality female gaze time as she matures.

[rotting sea cow]

1 hour ago, CornishDornish said:

It might be because even the faintest whiff of bi/homosexuality in men is not tolerated in Westeros.

There is nothing that indicates that Westeros is actively persecuting homosexuals. Probably is not the most normal thing, but it may be tolerated.  We have

- Renly & Loras

- Kem the sellsword and "his friend" back at KL

- Runnymudd & Garth at the Wall

Probably others