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I've been seeing a lot of posts and discussions recently about writing female characters in fanfic. There are too many for me to address specifically, but it seems to boil down to what it always tends to in fandom: there are a lot of people out there, each with their own backgrounds and reasons and hang-ups and issues. Oh, fandom. And as usual, my reaction tends to be: whatever you do, it's usually a bad idea to let fear or anticipation of other people's opinions control your actions, especially when those opinions prevent you from creating things. Others' opinions expanding your worldview and inspiring you to take action is one thing; being guilted or pressured into action is something else.
( wherein I ramble about writing women )
I wandered a bit there, but my point is this: IMO, there's no good reason not to write female characters, and lots of valid reasons in favor of the practice. If you do look at yourself and see that you don't, I think it's worth your while to try to figure out why. If you look around and see others not writing, try to understand that, too, rather than attacking them for it. I think stopping at "because it's fun to write men" isn't good enough. If it's "because it's fun to write these men," that works better for me – but there are very likely women out there with similar characteristics, so what's stopping you from writing them, too? These are questions well worth asking of yourself. What you do with the answers is your business (although please don't let fear or self-consciousness decide your actions), but at least try to understand it rather than being blithely righteous about doing it the way you always have.
Anyway, enough with the srs bzns meta portion, and on to the fun part! It's one thing to talk the blah blah blah, but allow me to demonstrate via fun with memes:
Give me a female character and a prompt (feel free to use any number of meme formats; give me someone you'd like her to have a conversation with, give me a pairing, a theme, a mood word, a situation – whatever you like!) and I will write you commentfic. Feel free to tell me a little something about why you like said character in your comment, if you wish, and I will try to tailor my ficlet accordingly. ♥
( wherein I ramble about writing women )
I wandered a bit there, but my point is this: IMO, there's no good reason not to write female characters, and lots of valid reasons in favor of the practice. If you do look at yourself and see that you don't, I think it's worth your while to try to figure out why. If you look around and see others not writing, try to understand that, too, rather than attacking them for it. I think stopping at "because it's fun to write men" isn't good enough. If it's "because it's fun to write these men," that works better for me – but there are very likely women out there with similar characteristics, so what's stopping you from writing them, too? These are questions well worth asking of yourself. What you do with the answers is your business (although please don't let fear or self-consciousness decide your actions), but at least try to understand it rather than being blithely righteous about doing it the way you always have.
Anyway, enough with the srs bzns meta portion, and on to the fun part! It's one thing to talk the blah blah blah, but allow me to demonstrate via fun with memes:
Give me a female character and a prompt (feel free to use any number of meme formats; give me someone you'd like her to have a conversation with, give me a pairing, a theme, a mood word, a situation – whatever you like!) and I will write you commentfic. Feel free to tell me a little something about why you like said character in your comment, if you wish, and I will try to tailor my ficlet accordingly. ♥