…No-one said all feminist allies are inauthentic. Just the ones who talk about treating women like people, then treat the women I'm their personal lives like shit.

I can't quite separate her gender from the relationship like you're able to - and part of what I find so repugnant is the public image he created, that involved his wife/family. Without that, we do have a private, terrible relationship. With that added layer, I personally find it more heinous and hypocritical. My…

I think that it's possible, but I'm not sure that it nullifies the toxicity of that environment and can't be applied to the institution as whole.

No Lucy, no Xena.

I'm not arguing your post, but clarifying that, given the way his justification for cheating, his excuses, were framed in Cole's account, that his word choice, and her perception of his language, implied he was using her, playing with her emotions and headspace for his own gratification.

But there is legitimate criticism of Inara, Kaylee, and River.

Yeah, but she hasn't made a career out of saying "Look at how feminist I am!"

But then when we have an institution that rewards the selling of bodies as commodities for financial gain - with a dynamic skewed for women selling themselves primarily to powerful men, isn't that a sexist institution - and that by engaging in it, his feminism is suspect?

>we have the right to bodily autonomy, and that we are not things for you to consume and play with

There is criticism existing of how he returns to the trope of "physically petite, supernaturally skilled, mentally broken" for more than a few of his modern female characters - I once read an opinion that Whedon likes to write about power - how it's perceived as used, moreso than any legitimacy of female characters of…

All the upvotes.

In her account, she talks about how he had an initial affair, and they agreed to work past it/ through it.

Cheating because you get off on the power it gives you over a woman, while building a career on how you treat women better than others, is indeed, bullshit. And a feminist issue, because Whedon is lieing about respecting women.

Which is why he's speaking at events called "Equality Now" about feminism. Not related to his work at all.

Because there's just one way to respond to infidelity. Tell me more about this "real feminism"?

According to her, he wrote her a letter saying he didn't find strength and value in his marriage. He enjoyed living a double life where he had a wife and kids one night, and "beautiful, needy, aggressive women" another night.

Adulterers who build their careers on praising their partners, whose work centers around how great marriage is - I'm inclined to find their work hollow and hypocritical after the fact.

It does merit being honest with your partner that you want to sleep with other people, especially if you value her opinions, thoughts, and feelings.

If their work is tied into themes of fidelity and marriage, and they promote themselves as having a strong marriage and taking strength and finding value in their relationship then yes, the legitimacy of their work is undermined.

Actually, it would, because he's not hiding behind the shield of his supposed feminism as a cover-up for his power trips. Does it make it better? Probably not, but it makes him much less of a hypocrite.