Ricochet is the best place on the internet to discuss the issues of the day, either through commenting on posts or writing your own for our active and dynamic community in a fully moderated environment. In addition, the Ricochet Audio Network offers over 50 original podcasts with new episodes released every day.
“Outlander” and Manliness: Why American Women Love This Show
The Starz TV series “Outlander” has become something of a phenomenon. In three seasons, it has done more to explain why women are longing for real manliness in their counterparts. The observant can see the vast difference in the men in this show and the man on the street. It is partially a function of time travel; the men women are particularly enamored of are the men in the 1700s. This cannot explain all of the fascination.
Kilts. It’s the kilts.
It isn’t, really, but it is the manliness and security required to wear clothing that could expose the most sensitive and vulnerable parts of a man. It should come as no surprise that Outlander (the book) has been studied for its intense and nuanced views of male/female interactions. There is even a popular paperback book called Finding Fraser which describes the modern woman’s lament and search for her own version of James Fraser, the male lead.
In order to really dive into the deep end of this, the show and the books need to be examined. I may mention character names without explanations. This is partly to save the show for people who want to be surprised, but pretty much everything that I am writing about requires a…
SPOILER ALERT
I hope that at this point, those who want the show to be a surprise have left off.
Let us begin with a quick overview.
Outlander is a book about a WW2 combat nurse, Claire Randall, who accidentally travels through time back to 1742 Scotland. She travels back 202 years. During that time, she arouses suspicion as a well-spoken Englishwoman in the Highlands during another conflict between the English and the Scots. During the course of the show, Claire attempts to find a way to travel back to her husband in the 1940s, an MI-5 agent Frank Randall. Unfortunately, the suspicion aroused by her sudden appearance puts her in danger, requiring an arranged marriage to a Scottish outlaw, James Alexander Malcolm MacKenzie Fraser (JAMMF, in the fandom). Of course, there’s a love triangle and of course, things get complicated. But this is enough of a summary for our purposes of discussion here.
Claire finds herself in a new world. Scotland in the 1700s was not a welcoming place for women. Even by 1940s standards, Claire was an independent woman. The Highlands would be particularly dangerous for a woman who felt her worth. Men were not used to being disobeyed or neglected. The concept of toxic masculinity could be placed here and would not be exceptional for the time. While there are the negatives of being placed in a time where women had limited options to support themselves, there were also positives.
Men were expected to be the protectors. They were expected to support a woman. Men served a purpose. Diana Gabaldon, the author of the series, describes it from JAMMF’s perspective (emphasis mine):
“What in God’s name do you think a man is for?” he asked at last. He spoke quietly, but in tones of complete bewilderment. “Ye want to keep him as a pet, is it? A lapdog? Or a caged bird?” — Jamie (JAMMF) in Fiery Cross, Chapter 79
This is an essential understanding of the traditional interaction between men and women. Men should not seek to lord their strength over women, but instead use it toward their protection. In this way, women cannot control their men. There is a wildness and viciousness to the nature of man; it is untamed. To tame a man is to make him ineffective. It is to take his power away and to make the marital unit weaker, as there is no designated protector. There are no designated roles. Predictability of roles and expectations helps people to understand one another, as well as come to agreement. It does not change the strengths of each gender. Both maintain strength, but tend to use it in different ways.
“There comes a turning point in intense physical struggle where one abandons oneself to a profligate usage of strength and bodily resource, ignoring the costs until the struggle is over. Women find this point in childbirth; men in battle.” ― Diana Gabaldon, Outlander
Modern women have been seduced by the idea of equality in all things. The simple fact is that though they are equal in nature, they are not identical. At their core, even feminists know this. Cosmo, Elle, Vogue, and other left-leaning magazines applaud “Outlander” frequently for it’s feminism and for the female perspective given to the show. While applauding, they seem to ignore how very traditional their praise for the show is. Even though the husbands are nominal feminists for their time, their roles are all very traditional.
Women do not just like this. Women need this.
There is an unspoken desire for women to be taken care of by their men. They need their men to be pillars of strength. Magazines are too proud to admit or even maintain self-awareness that they are also bringing the need for tradition to the fore. Strength does not require men to be perpetually stoic during all times of adversity, foregoing any display of emotion, but it requires men to adhere to certain traditional gender stereotypes. Whether or not it is explicit, much of the popularity of “Outlander” is from the acknowledgement that even in changing times, with changing roles, with Claire becoming a doctor and having her own career, men need to be the men in the relationship. Women need that complementary role, but more importantly, women need protectors.
There comes a point later in the books when Claire is sexually assaulted. I sincerely hope that the TV series does not change this scene, since it is very human. Some of the men are of the mentality that sex is power, some violent, but some are pathetic, lonely, sad men who see this as their only way for human connection and female compassion. One of the offenders even cries during the entire exchange. Claire, though violated, still feels a sense of regret and remorse from this man and recalls him in later books.
Sexuality is nuanced in both the books and in the series. The traditional roles are explored, but also the idea of woman as aggressor and as violator (see books 7-9). There is a very clear delineation between the natural and the unnatural. There is a clear line between positive sexuality and negative sexuality. More importantly, the sexual politics are approached with a strong bias toward value. What is the value of the sexual act? What is the value of the human beings involved? Is human value being respected?
The sexual act is always framed with respect to the humans involved. Women everywhere appreciate this. In every sex scene there is, there is an emotional component. Everything has meaning. People are not simply props for some salacious exposure of skin. People have value. Men respect that value.
When women are violated or sex is used as a bargaining chip, the questions are brought forward, not only by the women, but by the men in their lives.
“And if your life is a suitable exchange for my honor, why is my honor not a suitable exchange for your life?” ― Diana Gabaldon, Outlander
Indeed. In modern times, the idea of honor is almost completely lost on the current generation. We do not even have a discussion about honor anymore. This is another point of seduction in “Outlander.” Honor? Men? Women? They are speaking of honoring one another and a sense of value!
Ultimately, the reason why “Outlander” is so popular is that it treats men as men. It judges men by their own standards: courage, strength, ability to protect, honor. It does not judge the men with today’s weakened and softer sensibilities. It judges them by their standards and by standards they have been genetically called to meet. It does not excuse them for being men, nor does it ask them to be something other than what they are. There are good men and there are bad men, but they are judged as men.
And it is refreshing.
Published in Entertainment
“Be without fear in the face of your enemies. Stand brave and upright, that the Lord may love thee.
Speak the truth always, even if it means your death. Protect the helpless and do no wrong.”
….Because of the Catholicism? Or the elegantly-phrased smut? ;-) Genuinely curious, here…
The plot description doesn’t explain what it means to “accidentally” travel through time, or what the prospects of returning to her own time might be. If she has reason to believe she is stranded in 1742, to live out the rest of her life and die circa 1800, then she is effectively widowed. Some time should be allotted for mourning, perhaps, but after that she has to make the best of her new life circumstances in a strange land permanently separated from all her family and friends.
Because despite my horsing around, the story makes some poignant observations about the difference between loving God and loving another human being, and the risks of letting our trust in God turn into a license let our guard down too much.
The cultural milieu of the story is Spanish-speaking Catholic, and to be honest, I think it’s easier for readers with some fondness and familiarity with the Catholic church to appreciate the subtleties of the story than it would be for someone ignorant of or hostile toward Catholicism.
It was instructive for me, at least, to see a portrait of the type of religious understanding I’m drawn to when it goes badly astray.
Will check out the book – and your observations, Midge…Thanks, much!
Sure. I was mostly poking fun. BUT: if it were me I would resist accepting that return to my beloved were hopeless; “permanence” would have to be explicitly known to me or realized over several years of efforts to get back. Geez, she traveled backwards in time inexplicably – isn’t it just as likely that she’d be dragged back to the future just as inexplicably at any time?
What if I were stranded on an uncharted island with Scarlett Johansson? Likely permanently stranded with this disgusting woman. Are you saying I would have a duty to consider myself widowed and – after an appropriate mourning period of course – mate with her for her and my own good? Not sure I can stomach it, but one must make the best of one’s new life circumstances after all.
See, Ed, I think there’s a key difference here. Men look for a loophole, women hew first to their commitments. That’s what makes the protagonist here sympathetic; she obviated her commitments as a last resort, for survival. Dude would’a been like “Whoo, here we go!”
It’s the Zeroth Commandment, comes long before all the others: “Be Fruitful and Multiply.” Sometimes you have to put your selfish impulses aside and obey God’s unambiguous orders…
He’s a saint!
Well, I was attempting to leave some space for people who wanted to explore the series themselves.
Ahem. Claire touches some mystical standing stones in a stone circle at Craig Na Duhn. She has a sensation of sickening falling, like when she was a child in a car accident when both her parents were killed. She awakens, for lack of a better word, to gunshots at the same stone circle. Only when she goes out to her car, there is no road, just the rest of a field, more shots coming closer. She ends up running from the shots fired, trying to understand where she was and what happened. She can only figure that there is a movie filming, but somehow using live ammo. Unexpectedly, she comes upon a particularly violent redcoat, an ancestor of her husband, Frank (the man they were studying prior to her slip back in time). He assumes she is a whore, being dressed in a knee length white dress without a corset, and begins to treat her as such. She attempts to explain her manner of dress and appeal to his better nature, discovering that history had recorded his nature much more kindly than reality demonstrates.
She is rescued by a Scot who decides that someone being attacked by the enemy must be a friend. They later decide she’s not, she’s an intruder or a spy on their land. She is taken, more or less, prisoner by the Scottish laird and is forced to live under house arrest for months. She bides her time attempting to learn how to get back to where she was, while navigating the Scottish Clan social structure and not knowing the native Scots or Gaelic.
After many months and pissing off this British redcoat even more, particularly humiliating him, he has made it clear that she will subject herself to British rule and be relinquished to him by morning.
Instead, the Scots (sorta kinda her friends, at least moreso than the Brits, who are exposed as largely cruel) give her a chance to marry one of their own undesirables who cannot marry anyone of repute. But in marrying her, she becomes subject to Scottish law; the law of her husband.
She is then stuck in a predicament whereby to live long enough, she must marry a Scot. She does attempt escape later and is soundly beaten for it.
Nice try. On a desert island there is still hope for rescue. Procreating with ScarJo gets you nowhere *except* in baseball analogies. More importantly, it only allows for incest in future generations.
It’s futile. Now, if you could guarantee that your kids would get off the island, that would be different.
I am reading the books and her research is excellent. I have not looked at any of the TV series and probably won’t as I don’t watch TV.