The Sidekick-him-while-he's-down

Today I'd like to talk a little about one of my favorite characters, courtesy of JK Rowling.

Raise your hand if you're familiar with the Harry Potter books. Not just the movies. I'm talking about the actual physical original books. (I hope there are a lot of people raising their hands out there.)

Now think about Ron Weasley. He's pretty okay, right? Ginger, funny, Harry's best friend and Hermione's love interest. Wait, are we still talking about the books? Because there's a lot more to recommend Mr Weasley if you take a look at the books instead of the movies.

[Spoilers!]

Big Damn Heroes

When you think of a stereotypical Strong Female Character in a book/movie/television show/play, how is she characterized? She's usually an overt warrior of some sort, tries to subvert the system and break out of her "feminine" boundaries, buddies up with the men, and berates or quietly judges her fellow women for not following in her footsteps.

So what do we do when presented with a Strong Female Character who doesn't quite fit into these standards? As an example I'd like to talk to you about Inara Serra of Firefly and Serenity; at a later date I'd like to discuss a few others as well.

[Beware: spoilers lie below this line!]

Vote Maggie

As an introduction to this post, I'd like to tell you a little about my 16-year-old sister, Maggie. First off, she's awesome. Her aspirations are somewhat inspiring; her "life plan" is to earn a PhD in history, become a tenured professor, be elected President for two terms and then serve as Secretary-General of the United Nations. Quite impressive, no?

Maggie is also hilariously entertaining, so of course I laughed this morning when she made this observation: 

Presidents are always old... They should lower the age so I can be President while I'm still young and hot. It's harder to be sexy when you're forty. My goal in life is to be a sexy political figure.

But then I started thinking about it. Why should that be so funny to me? Why shouldn't she be a "sexy political figure"? Here comes the Equality Train, and my sister has volunteered as the engineer.