For some reason, probably because of my recent completion of a college degree (bam!) and the large amounts of free time I now have on my hands, I’ve decided to revisit the TV show Daria from the late 90s. I remember watching it occasionally when I was younger. I had to change the channel every time my mom came in the room. The one time I wasn’t fast enough, she came in and talked to me for a minute; when she was silent for a minute, the sound from the TV filled the room and she looked horrified. “Does this cartoon have cuss words in it?” Anyway, I saw that it was on Netflix and I decided that I was interested in revisiting the asocial, sarcastic and monotonous Daria Morgendorffer.
Daria is a great character, but I’m undecided if she counts as feminist. She is not concerned about appearance or popularity in high school. She’s intelligent, witty and, importantly, the lead character on her own show. But, so far at least (which is the third episode), she doesn’t seem to actually be feminist. After all, she’s not really concerned with ‘advancing’ women, or even herself. She’s completely detached from the people around her. She’s uninterested in just about everything.
The ways that Daria and Quinn are treated differently are definitely evidence of an underlying feminist message. Daria, smart and intelligent, is often scolded for being too outspoken. In the first episode, “Esteemers,” she answers a question correctly in her history class. When no one knows the answer to another question, she answers again—only to be told by her teacher to “Stop showing off.” Quinn, vapid, airheaded, self-absorbed Quinn, is often thought by those around her to be the normal sister. This is definitely a critique of what passes for acceptable or unacceptable behavior from females in our society. Daria’s intelligence, outspokenness and her willingness to question authority are clearly not acceptable for teenage girls.
I think I like Daria so much because she’s a lot like I was in high school. I didn’t have the witty remarks or the awesome glasses, but I was completely uninterested in the high school culture. I refused to join clubs, no matter how great they would look on college applications. I also refused to take AP classes if they weren’t in subjects I enjoyed, again, no matter how great it would look. AP History was just not going to be worth the bonus points (plus, if I had taken AP, I wouldn’t have had the most enlightening day in history class ever: getting on the floor with pieces of paper balled up, and throwing them across the room at other students…you know, to simulate trench warfare. I’m not making this up.).
So, maybe if Daria is like me, she’s just a feminist in the making. But I don’t know. It’s hard to imagine sarcastic and slow-talking Daria as much of a political (or social) activist. In the meantime, however, her constant sarcastic commentaries and critiques of high school, femininity, and American upper middle-class culture are hilarious and entertaining.
