Women In The Bechdel Test

Over the last few decades, various films and television shows have started to introduce strong female protagonists with a story arc that does not revolve around its male counterparts. To truly test the extent of involvement of female characters in a film, the Bechdel-Wallace Test or as many know it as the Bechdel Test was created. The Bechdel Test was named after Alison Bechdel, the creator of the comic strip “Dykes to Watch Out For” in a segment called “The Rule”. For a film to pass the test, it must meet the following criteria:

1) “Have at least two named women

2) The women speak to each other

3) Their conversations are about anything but, the man” If the answer is yes to all the criteria, the film passes the Bechdel Test. Many movies released

The representation of the power dynamics between male and POC characters creates the notion of the ‘Other’. In bell hooks’ “Eating the Other: Desire and Resistance, she speaks of how “eating the other” can be in the context of how members of ancient cultures practice ripping a person’s heart to become the embodiment of their unique characteristics and spirit. In a metaphorical sense, “eating the other” emphasizes power and privilege. In hooks’ article, she mentions how the “Other” is exploited by “white supremacist capitalist patriarchy” (367). Exploitation is perpetuated through the deep rooted white supremacist ideals of the sexual desire and pleasure to challenge racial domination (367). The idea of having “primitive” (367) fantasies describes the West’s fascination of moving away from a Eurocentric commodity culture and appropriating the Other through fetishization and cultural appropriation. In Myra Macdonald’s “Muslim Women and the Veil”, the idea of “the scopic regime of modernity” (9) is “the desire to penetrate behind the veil” (9). The West’s obsession of unveiling captures the essence of colonialism as it is considered a way to make “aliens” conform to the dominating power. Muslim women veiling themselves rejects the male gaze and voyeurism hence the aspiration to “liberate” them becomes more desirable. Through these approaches, many films with people of colour fail the anti-racist Bechdel Test due to the lack of a story arc in those characters. Women of colour are fetishized on screen to be exotic or otherworldly, serving to be an appealing supporting character to the male protagonist. The need for Western culture to assert their dominance over people of colour on screen becomes higher to create the false notion of diversity but, in reality serve deep rooted colonial ideals. Along with serving as the only person of colour to create some sort of diversity only to serve