TWOP Pembleton said:


I'm one who thinks that gender issues sometimes get blown out of proportion, but it's a very real issue in Survivor. Only 3 women have beaten men at F2 so far, compared to 8 men winning over women. Is this due to gender bias on the part of the juries? Or is it because of the way things just happened to play out? I dunno, and hopefully a good discussion here can clarify the issue.

I just thought of a couple more gender issues. We've had one all male F2, but three all female F2s, including an all female F3. Is this due to gender solidarity, or just happenstance? Also, there always seems to be talk of an all-female alliance, but I can't think of any discussion of an all-male alliance outside of the gender-split seasons.

The real fun for gender issue folks would be an all female cast season, followed by an all male cast season. :-)

On class, I think a discussion of how different backgrounds have shaped people's strategies on the show would be interesting. How did Chris, a highway worker, win with a Final Tribal Council performance as good as Brian's, a used car salesman? Was Denise at a disadvantage due to being a small town lunch lady, er, janitor? We've seen rich people flame out (BB in season one), relatively poor people do well (Chris, Twila, Sandra, etc.). Does class have anything to do with one's performance on the show?

(This is my first topic ever, I hope I did it right!)

I definitely think there is some truth to that whole, "If a man's aggressive, he's strong, whereas a woman is a bitch" sentiment. Of the female winners we have had, only (and it PAINS me to say this) Jenna has really been an overtly aggressive player, and her season's tribes were split by gender until well into the game. Tina, Vee, Sandra, and Danni were all largely stealth players, who got the "nice person" vote over a less liked F2 opponent. OTOH, Hatch, Brian, Tom, Aras, Yul, and Todd all made no secret about how hard they were playing, and largely got the "respect" vote for the win.

Since the introduction of the Final 3 over Final 2, I've wondered if that set-up makes it harder for a woman to win. (And the conspiracy theorist in me wonders if that's why they changed the final format.) While I watched Amanda decide who to vote out at final 4 between Denise and Todd, I told my sister that if I was ever on the show, I would do everything I could to have an all-female Final 3. Not for "solidarity" or anything, but for the reasons that have been discussed in many episode threads, contestant threads, and recaps.

Since none of the Finals 3's have resulted in a female winner, this made me wonder, what female winners would have still won had there been a Final 3? This is of course all hypothetical, and we'd never really know without seeing the actual jury performance (ahem, Amanda), but I think it's interesting to think about.

Tina: I think she would have won regardless, even with Keith in finale.
Vecepia: That would have been an all female final 3 (which I think Kathy would have won).
Jenna: I have very little doubt that Rob C. would have won.
Sandra: Fairplaycould be persuasive, but I think Sandra still would have won. Though I could see Fairplay being convincing.
Amber: I think all of Amber's votes would have gone to Jenna, with the exception of Shii Ann's. She might have still voted for Amber (and definitely not for Jenna).
Danni: I don't think Rafe's presence in the F3 would have changed the outcome. Well, except that Steph would have received no votes.

As for women that would have been included had there been a F3:
Thailand: Jan- Yeah, I don't think she'd have won.
ASS: Jenna- I would guess no. Only three of Amber's votes were "anti-Rob" votes. Since I don't know what would happen in a tie, I can't guess.
Vanuatu: Scout- Hahaha.
That's it right?

In my opinion, none of the male winners would have been hurt with a woman added to the final three, but two of the women (Jenna, Sandra) could have possibly lost with the addition of the third-place man. Of course, this doesn't prove anything, it's just fun to speculate.

Thanks khaavren for starting the thread!

Argh! Explorer just ate a long post. Here's an attempt to reconstruct the relevant parts.

That was a great breakdown, BatFantastic. I think Kelly would have won with an F3 in Borneo. Rudy would be a vote Rich would miss, plus that would put Gretchen on the jury, and I feel positive she'd have voted for Kelly. With Rudy stealing a vote or two from Rich, Rich becomes an afterthought and people start thinking challenge monsters should win. Hmm....

In Pearl Islands, I wonder if Fairplay even makes it to F3, or do Darrah/Sandra/Lillian Morris band together? Or does Fairplay still go as the ultimate anti-vote generator? :-) I can't remember the end-game politics of that season too clearly, I need to give it a rewatch.

For the ultimate in gender wars, we have Thailand. I love that season, but I can acknowledge there was a lot of overt sexism displayed, particularly by one Clay Shaw. I still think Brian took Clay over Jan specifically to get Helen's vote (and Ted's as a result of Clay's supposed racism).

Why haven't we seen an attempt to build an all-male alliance (outside Vanuatu and Amazon, of course)? The very first alliance ever mentioned was Stacy Stillman's attempt at an all-female alliance in Borneo, and we've seen that attempted, at least half-heartedly, many times since. Why one and not the other? Are the alpha males too threatened by other males? Is the status of women in our society such that they naturally band together for support? I have no clue, but am interested in discussion on this issue.

I can remember all-male alliances being tried in the two seasons where the tribes were divided by gender: Amazon and Vanuatu. In Amazon, Roger and Dave tried to band all the males together after the merge, since they had a 6-4 advantage. The problem was the some of the other men--chiefly Cesternino--saw right through it, knew they would be voted out eventually, and banded with the women instead. In Vanuatu, the "Fat Five" (Chris, Bubba, Sarge, Rory, and Chad) pledged to go to the end together, but the really screwed up tribal switch, which basically rewarded the women for sucking in competitions by allowing them to get rid of the men, kept them from ever having the numbers. Also, in Exile Island, the Terry/Dan/Austin/Nick alliance fell apart because they kept losing challenges.

I think one of the problems with Survivor is that gender becomes a huge predictor of who will go home at what time, especially in recent seasons that seem to emphasize brute strength team challenges in the early going. The women (perceived rightly or wrongly as physically weaker) are mostly targeted until the merge, then the men (viewed as physical threats) afterward. The endgame favors the men, I think, because not only the double standard of "strong man=leader, strong woman=bitch," but also possibly because the juries probably usually have more men than women (since men are voted out after the merge).

I think that sexism sometimes plays a more obvious role in final jury votes than other times. If Becky (Cook Islands) had been a male, I think that she would have at least gotten a couple of votes, since she may have been seen as a wise collaborator who was Yul's equal but smartly allowed him to take the heat, instead of the little girl who let the big strong man do all the work. Other times, I don't know that it has an effect. Aras won Exile Island because he was a leader who kept the tribe together while Danielle sat back and let he and Cirie do almost all the work of their alliance.

I think Colby would have won because from what I remember, some of the jury thought that Colby's decision to choose Tina over Keith was the reason they chose her (IMO, they gave her supposed under the radar, I'm just a weak old woman strategy more cunning than it really had). So if Colby didn't have to choose, then he would have probably won Outback.

This reminds me of something Jonathan Penner once posted on the Survivor blag. I think he asked how many of the winners had college educations (keeping in topic on whether or not Dreamz had a shot of winning period, pre-Truckgate). Most of them did, and to a degree your background shapes you. Earl's Final Tribal Council was probably the most effective one in recent seasons, as he answered the questions articulately and shrewdly and won unanimously in a nine person jury against two other people. Part of that eloquence might have been his background in advertising, maybe contrasted with Dre's lack of social etiquette. However, not every person plays the role they're assumed to play. Lawyers aren't all silver-tongued, and not every contestant not from California or New York is an absolute hick by default. It's not a direct correlation what your job/class is and how you act. Although... I like the idea that bartenders may never win.

How many contestants on Survivor don't have college degrees? My impression is that they're by far the minority, but I don't really know.

Becky had also done a humiliating job at the firemaking challenge, and she was apparently very lazy in camp. If she had been a man up against Ozzy or Yul, I think she may have garnered the same amount of votes.

I thought Chris' jury performance was mawkish and very phony, and Brian nearly lost against one of the most hated players of the season. I do see that a lot of people respected their performances, don't get me wrong. To me, they won because they took a player who was hated (or more hated) by the jury.

I think the most blatant example of class and gender punishments on Survivor was the Jenna/Matt final 2. The cool kids persecuting uncool Matt. Deena going on about sexism even though I don't remember Matt ever being sexist.

Then Tina, who was a wonderful player, don't get me wrong, also won in part because some of the jury (Alicia) wanted a woman to win.

There is that element which pops up in Survivor sometimes, although there is also the reverse, probably more often the reverse. The misogyny in some final juries can turn the stomach (I think Alex's loathing of Cassandra had a lot of misogyny). But in other cases, I think a female player simply did not play a good game or let themselves fall through the cracks, and then when they lose because of their mistakes, the automatic response is often, "It's sexism."

The editing certainly doesn't help (remember the way they edited that Becky/Sundra firemaking challenge).

If I remember correctly, she got pissed because Matt said that it was "Every man for himself" at one point, and she thought that he was basically discrediting the women (Jenna and Heidi.) Which, in my opinon, didn't make him sexist. It is a comman phrase, and yes, it would have been better to add "and woman" to that saying, but I think he simply just forgot, and he wasn't intending to slam the women on purpose. But it didn't matter. I remember Matt apologised and acted nice/humble about it, but Deena still didn't seem impressed. I think she just hated him, and wanted to ruin his chances at winning, so she called him a big old sexist. This was coming from a woman who was actually kind of sexist herself, since I remember slamming the male gender as a whole several times.

One example I can think about class playing a part was, according to Gervase on the S1 commentary, Jenna Lewis (and maybe Colleen) wanted to vote for Kelly W., simply because she was a "poor" river guide, while Hatch was a successful business person (I can't remember what he exactly did, before winning, and then going to jail.) If that is true, that's kind of an uncool way to pick a winner.



There was one other one that could be considered an all-male alliance: the Boran Boys' Club in Africa. I remember hearing that Ethan/Lex/Big Tom fully attended to go to the F3 themselves, but Kim J.'s sudden immunity wins messed that up. I can't remember if Kim J. was offically an alliance member with them, but I do remember that they wanted to dump her, and then they could duke it out.

I don't know if she would have received votes, but I think Becky would have been edited to be more of an equal partner to Yul if she were a man.

I had forgotten the Boran Boys Club! Good recall. Yeah, ol' KimJ screwed that up good. Another instance of the F3 winner picking the eventual winner, too

Have there been any really wealthy people on Survivor besides BB? I know there have been people who are quite comfortable financially, but I always had the impression BB was a whole different class from the rest of Pagong.

Here's a breakdown of each season's merge tribe/F4/winner:

S1: 5 each / 2 each / male winner. Interestingly, the merge voted off in a perfect m/f/m/f pattern the whole way.
S2: 5 each / 2 each / female winner.
S3: 5 each / 2 each / male winner.
S4: 5 each / 1 male and 3 females / female winner.
S5: 5 males / 3 females (1 additional female on jury), 2 each in F4 / male winner.
S6: 6 male, 4 females / then 3 males, 1 female / female winner.
S7: 5 each / 3 females, 1 male / female winner.
S8: 5 females, 4 males / 2 each / female winner.
S9: 4 males, 5 females / 3 females, 1 male / male winner.
S10: 4 males, 6 females / 2 each / male winner.
S11: 6 males, 4 females / 3 females, 1 male / female winner.
S12: 6 males, 4 females / 2 each / male winner.
S13: 5 males, 4 females (2 females and 1 male also on jury) / 2 each / male winner.
S14: 7 males, 3 females (1 each also on jury) / 3 males, 1 female / male winner. By far the most sexist season yet.
S15: 5 each / 3 females, 1 male / male winner.

What I see is that, for the most part, the sexes have been relatively even at the merge (or close with a 9 person merge). 5 times there have been 3 females in F4, only twice has there been 3 males in F4. Through Guatemala, the winners were evenly distributed, then it's turned into a real sausage fest. A result of the new F3 wrinkle? Or just statistical anomaly? I've got detailed spreadsheets on all of this if anyone has any other questions about distribution of gender.

The one thing I couldn't get (I tried) was education background. The bios are just too unreliable for that. Even employment is hard to go by, since half these people are really mactors living in LA. Political background is also unavailable, but I do remember from interviews with Kel that conservative views are out of step with most of the others. Although he might have done better with Kucha that season. And we all remember Frank's glorious political flameout to protect Teresa, right? 8-)

I don't know about really wealthy, but I remember Carl the dentist being targeted in Africa by Playskool simply because he had talked about his expensive car collection and how much money he made. Rodger's relative financial comfort in the Outback season is what spurred the Colby/Tina/Keith alliance to boot him over Elisabeth, and I remember Brian cringing at his video from home because of how his porny wife showed off his own car collection, their huge baby grand piano, and all-around posh looking house. In that respect, class has mattered in Survivor because there have been alliances that considered need/financial status as a reason for keeping someone over someone with more financial stability.

Around the time the Cook Islands tie episode aired, people posted comments from interviews with previous contestants who had done the firemaking tiebreaker that Becky-Sundra's performance was pretty typical (which makes sense as Becky and Sundra had practiced). Editing the tiebreaker that way fit into the script the show was pushing in a way that it hadn't in previous seasons. And the script was that the women were along for the ride while the menfolk worked, which IMHO wasn't really true. The Aitu4 were a unit.

Although I have no problems with Yul's victory in that particular season because he did seem to be the leader of the unit, I think the problem is that men are default assumed to be the leaders across the board whereas women have to prove it. For example, take Africa. Why should Ethan have won over Mama Kim? They were equal parts of a strong alliance. Sure Mama Kim would have been out four if she hadn't won immunity, but she did and the final immunity besides. Mama Kim earned her way into the finals whereas Ethan was taken (did Ethan win any individual immunities?). They played essentially the same game prior to that: they stuck together in an alliance that got the numbers and rode that alliance to the end. So why did Ethan cream her?

Same thing with Earl. I didn't watch that season very often, so maybe there's a solid reason that I didn't see, but even if you take the final tribal council performances out of it, my impression was that Earl was just assumed to be the leader. But Cassandra and Dreamz enabled the most important play (the Edgardo/HI burn). Cassandra was the one who linked the alliance to Dreamz. But she was viewed as a coattail rider.

In most alliances, everyone is really riding each other's coattails because that's the only way an alliance works. Yet with very rare exceptions (Matt!), women are seen as coattail riders on men and never the reverse. And it's hard to prove dynamics that people haven't seen strongly enough to change someone's mind about the vote at a Tribal Council .

To their credit, the idiots also targeted Carl because they suspected he was the one of his alliance who would lose a trivia tiebreaker (and he was).

I remember Helen from Thailand voting for Clay at the first TC because he was wealthy.

Then there was the big debate in All-Stars about whether it was fair for some of the non-winning players to target players who had won.


That was so long ago I can't remember much now, but I think she may have been fairly wealthy, which meant some of the jury would have hesitated at voting for her. Some of them also said she was not very pleasant to be around.

I think one of the biggest ways sexism effects women at F2 is the "am I embarrassed to lose to you" question that the jurors consciously or unconciously ask themselves. I'm pretty sure male jurors -- especially young, strong, reasonably good-looking male jurors -- have way less of a problem losing to, say, Tom or Ethan or even a "hot chick" like Jenna, than they do to someone like Mama Kim or Katie or Lill. I think that's a HUGE part of the reason why Katie in particular got raked over the coals by Gregg. He was embarrassed to be beaten by a young, kind of flabby, kind of bitchy girl. He really had no problem with her "patheticness" right up until it seemed like she might win a million dollars while he sat and watched on the sidelines.

I think there are two things that hurt women contestants.

post-poned merge and F3.

For the post-poned merge. Think of it, if we had a regular merge in Fiji, Cook Islands, we wouldn't have lost Jenny, or Michelle. Women get picked off in pre-merge game. So obviously, having a post-poned merge would make them more vulnerable.



For the Becky/Sundra firemaking thing. Ian/Jenn and Bobby Jon/Steph, their firemaking challenge was just as long. I believe Ian/Jenn was 2.5 hours.

So I feel bad that they got the shaft in editing.

Women don't always get picked off pre-merge. I showed upthread that, outside of Fiji, the split has been pretty equitable through the years, with most seasons being a 5/5 split at merge.

I'm not saying anything more about the substance of what you're saying, because I've had my say, but please do not characterize people's responses as "automatic" or poorly thought out simply because you don't agree with them. Stay on the topic of the show and gender issues on the show, and not your opinion of other people's opinions of the show. Thanks.

I've been thinking about the idea that women can't get away with scheming in the game the same way that men can. The idea that after all of the lying and backstabbing required to be a good player, men are respected for their gameplay where women are asked to defend their character. JR's question to Amanda vs. his question to Todd, the jury's treatment of Aras vs. Danielle, Chris vs. Twila, and Tom vs. Katie are all examples of this.

With that in mind, think about Cirie. In my opinion, she was one of the best schemers to play the game. We can never know for sure, but it's hard for me to imagine the jury raking her character over the coals like they did Danielle, or Katie. Even if the players had been harsh with her, she had become the fan favorite, the stand-out player of the season. It makes me wonder if she's just a rare exception, or if she did something to transcend the stereotypes.

I also think Stephenie is an interesting player, when it comes to gender issues. She was arguably the most popular female contestant ever, after Palau. But her game strategy in Palau was pretty sucky. I don't know how much of that was her fault, but she didn't really strike me as a good player that season, however likable she was. Then she plays again in Guatemala, and in my opinion, played a great strategic game. But the public's perception of her (some of the public, not all, of course) went down drastically. When she was struggling to stay afloat a sinking ship in Palau she was lovable and plucky. When she was a successful schemer in Guatemala, she was entitled and bitchy.

Maybe it's only "okay" for women to play the strategy part of the game really hard when they're playing from the bottom. For a while, Cirie always seemed to be the next one out. (Not to meniton being surrounded by leaves.) Palau Steph had to endure survivor hell. To stay likable and keep your scheming separate from your character, do women need to first be in a desperate game position? Lil doesn't really fit into that theory, but I wonder if that idea holds true in other situations.

I don't know if that's the case, but I do think that a woman must appear "nice" and upfront on the surface in order to not get it thrown back in their face, especially if they're up against a strong man. Tina is a good example--from the moment Jeff V. was voted out, she and Colby essentially controlled the rest of the game. However, because she played the nice "mom" role to everyone, she got crucial votes from Alicia, Nick and Elisabeth. I do think everyone knew she controlled the game just as much as Colby did, but the ones who voted on personality were turned off by Colby's challenge wins and semi-arrogance, thus giving Tina the win.

As for Steph, IMO the reason a lot of people lost their sympathy for her during the Guatemala season is that, a lot of the time, she was just as smug as her alliance-mates once she got control, even though she whined and complained constantly during the Palau season about how much it sucked to lose. Personally, I thought she was a bit ungracious at times and got a little too comfy with her status in the game. Not to mention that allying yourself with Judd would never be a way to get yourself into my good graces. Scumbags. ;)

Now, Nutjob, don't be a bad sportsmanships. :P

For my money, I'm firmly convinced that there's definitely a double standard about how women play and how men play on Survivor.

I can't recall if this was mentioned upthread, or merely in a different thread, but while I think Yul deserved the win in Cook islands, I also think that had Becky been a man, Yul might not have gotten that win; or at least, Becky might have gotten at least one vote. I've noticed that men can say, "I was in on all this, I helped make decisions, but the blood is on his hands, not mine, and therefore I deserve your vote because I played cleaner than my alliance mate," and is seen as playing strategically by some parties. Whereas a woman who tries to employ this strategy gets slammed with the "letting someone else do her dirty work" and "riding of coattails" bullshit Survivor juries seem to love sooooooo much.

While I do think that men and women are equally as stereotyped on Survivor, I would argue that the stereotypes forced on women can be- and usually are- much more damaging in the final TC.

I mean, just look at this season. Peih-Gee and Todd played a similar game- well, okay, Todd tried and failedto play it, while Peih-Gee was (in my opinion) for better or worst, the best strategic player this season- but Peih-Gee was branded a heinous bitch by the Survivor PTB, and Todd got the "OMG HE IS A STRATEGIC MAGIC MAN WITH AWESOME POWERS OF SNEAKINESS AND LOOK AT HIM FUCKING UP AND WINNING ONLY THROUGH THE OVERWHELMING SHORT-SIGHTED INCOMPETENCE OF EVERYONE AROUND HIM... AHEM, MAKING BRILLIANT STRATEGIC MOVES, YEEEEEEEEES" edit. I'm of the opinion that, had Peih-Gee been a man, she would have gotten the Plucky Scheming Last Man Standing edit.

You know what else is interesting about this season? Both Amanda and Peih-Gee could arguably be named the 'challenge monsters' of the season- faint praise in such a season as China, I'll admit, but numbers don't lie- but not a thing was made of it; whereas I can't think of a season when a man in their position did not bang the I Won II Challenges A Lot drum, even if it was in a weaksauce season.



I totally dig what you're saying here, BatFantastic. I think my take on it is that you have to fit into one of the Types of Women Survivor Likes molds to get the hero edit while PSWAV. (Playing Survivor With A Vagina, for all of you who don't understand my many and often lame acronyms, heh.) Palau-era Steph was sweet and pretty and- I hate to throw this phrase out there, but it can't be denied- "America's Sweetheart". Guatemala-era Steph was admittedly twat-y quite a bit of the time, but what I think screwed her over was that she was still trying to be Palau-era Steph, instead of just embracing the Hot Bitchy Chick mantle; we can forgive and even like Hot Bitchy Chicks who scheme and lie and actually play the game, but not Sweet Girls who do the same.

As for Cirie, she was the Mother Woman that Survivor likes so much, so we forgave her the delusions she had of, you know, actually playing a well-rounded strategic game with the goal of winning. Because women can only strategize if they are in a non-threatening (to men, in specific) box, you know.

I think one of Steph's main problems was that she played clumsily in Guatemala. There's an art to voting people out without betraying every single person in the game, and she didn't have it.

Not to mention that she was a smug bitch most of the time too.

In the case of Danielle vs. Aras, Terry was probably not voting for a woman against a man, especially not an athlete like Aras who had been Terry's main challenge competitor. I doubt he votes for the woman in any potential woman/man F2 of that season with the possible exception of Sally, if she made the F2.

I think one of the reasons that we hear of "female alliances" as if they are this special thing and we never hear of "male alliances", even though they have existed in the past, is very social.

Because we used to live in a very patriarchal society, there was eventually a need for the feminist movement: women banding together to protect their interests. Feminism still lives on, women still rally together against inequality. However, there was never a need for a Masculist (? Is there even a word?) movement. There was never an opportunity for men to rally together BECAUSE they were men.

Therefore, I think in North America, women are socialized to be solidary because that solidarity has been needed both in the past and now. So while both men and women have founded unisex alliance, we're more likely to hear "We've allied together because we're women" than we ever would "We've allied together because we're men."

Just out of curiousity, I did some number crunching to see how the sexes fare in challenges. Here are the results.

Reward Challenges

Women have won 17.3% of all RCs competed in.
Men have won 29.46% of all RCs competed in.

Immunity Challenges

Women have won 11.62% of all ICs competed in.
Men have won 20.11% of all ICs competed in.

Total

Women have won 13.84% of all challenges competed in.
Men have won 23.62% of all challenges competed in.

Just some food for thought. It does appear that men have a marked advantage overall in challenges.

I'm not understanding your numbers khaavren- are you saying that the average woman on survivor will win about 14% of all the individual challenges she competes in while the average man will win about 24% of those he competes in?

That's essentially what I'm saying. I'll go do some more number crunching and get overall winning percentages by gender.

Here we go. The numbers add up to more than 100% because there have been multiple challenges with more than one winner. At least two Immunity Challenges like that that I can think of.

Reward Challenges:
Men have won 90% of all RCs.
Women have won 61.43% of all RCs.

Immunity Challenges:

Men have won 60% of all ICs.
Women have won 43.64% of all ICs.

Total Challenge performance:

Men have won 71.67% of all challenges.
Women have won 50.56% of all challenges.

Interesting seasons of note for immunity challenges. (These really threw things off balance.)

S2 Australia: 8-0 for men. Mostly Colby.
S4 Marquesas: Women won 7-1 over men.
S10 Palau: 7-0 for men. Mainly Tom/Ian.
S13 Cook Islands: 5-0 for men. Mainly Ozzy.

Except for those 4 seasons, ICs have been fairly evenly distributed between the genders, with a slight edge to men.

I don't actually think this is as much a gender issue as a basic principle that people like other people who are nice to them and/or suck up to them during jury speeches. I mean, yeah, being personable is a big part of winning Survivor (note: did not see Amazon/Thailand seasons). I don't doubt Tina's Nice Mom persona was a big part in why she got votes. Just like Earl and Yul were Nice Guys and Amber and Danni were Sweet Girls. Obviously, there's other factors, but I haven't seen a season in which a person who was viewed as "mean"/not nice by jurors won (remember: Todd's nasty little confessionals were confessionals, not public services announcements, and Tom was mostly viewed as a nice guy--the jurors did not see him at F3).

Also, I don't agree that Colby "essentially controlled" the game. When I watched it for the second time, I kept thinking, "Damn, Colby is out of the loop, isn't he?" At least a few times, he was on the wrong side of the votes, without a compelling explanation that he was kept in the loop and doing a split vote or something. I really think Tina and Keith ran that game, but I think it's difficult to tell, because there are so few strategic conversations shown in Australia.

I would say that seasons 4 (Marqueses, Vesepia over Neleh), 5 (Thailand, Brian over the other guy whose name i forget, Cray?), and 7 (Pearl Islands, Sandra over Lil), the winner was definitely not "nice" (or at least not nice like Amber and Danni) but the second place person was (viewed by the jury) even less "nice." If nothing else, that's what made the change to a F3 instead of an F2 a huge difference in the dynamics of the game.

I just recently watched all of S3-Africa, including the reunion, in which Kelly Goldsmith commented that even in reality TV, women tend to be depicted as either the villian (Jeri), or the ingenue/sweetheart (Elisabeth) and there are very few depicted otherwise (although I'd probably add "mom" (Tina) to that list).

Yeah, typical Virgin/Whore dichotomy, as seen all throughout literature, and it's interesting that it's translated so well to reality television. I think the best example on Survivor is indeed Australia, as you suggested. However, I don't think the difference is as stark on every single season. For example, this last season Amanda, Courtney, and Peih-Gee really couldn't really be "put" into either category.

Perhaps not as exactly, but I'd say that the editing suggested Peih-Gee and Courtney more "villian" and Amanda more "ingenue/sweetheart."

I'd say Courtney was more comic relief than "virgin" or "whore". Amanda definitely wasn't a "sweetheart" since the other castmates apparently found her personality lacking, and also because she was shown to us as actively strategizing as much as the men. Peih-Gee had a really amibiguous edit, I think; you could root for or against her pretty easily. The person reduced to being the "virgin" or "ingenue" in China was actually Erik.

This is one of my favorite hypothetical methods of strategy, but has it ever been actively used and flaunted in this way by a male? Oddly, I think the only success for this type of player is Amber, but even she didn't make a strong attempt to spin it this way at FTC. Amanda played similarily, but again, didn't try and spin it to the jury in this way and instead, "batted her giant doe eyes" at them and tried to play apologetically. Finally, Becky could have made an attempt at this strategy, but I believe her when she says that she knew she wouldn't win and didn't want to steal Yul's votes and allow Ozzy to win.

Is it perhaps that men underestimate their female alliance-mates and don't expect them to make a case based on this strategy, whereas they won't let a male position themselves in such a way to make the same case and potentially win? For this reason, it would have been interesting to witness a Lex v Ethan or Tom v Ian final 2.



I hate defending Colby, as I think he's sort of a douchebag, but I do think Tina and Keith were dead meat without him. While I definitely agree that Keith and Tina controlled the latter bit of the game, they were at his mercy at Ogakor and only survived because Colby joined forces with them against Mitchell. Similarly, I think the game would have been usurped by Kucha at F7 had Colby not been there to keep Amber from recognizing she was bottom of the totem pole and flipping to Nick/Rodger/Elisabeth.



Which just furthers Kelly's accusations, IMO; despite being a force in both strategy and physical prowess, Amanda was reduced by the editors (and, by the end, herself) to being just the helpless sweetheart who should lose to the almighty Todd.

Lex/Ethan I think would have been won by Ethan 5-2. Brandon and Frank are the Lex-votes, Brandon because Lex didn't vote him out and because of Ethan's question, and Frank because he thought Ethan was " a useless piece of furniture"(I believe that's how he described him in an interview) and respected Lex more.

As for other men, I think Edgardo was trying for some version of the Nice Other Half Strategy(with Alex) in Fiji.

Season 1. The players admired Hatch's gameplay, but I doubt many of them thought he was a nice guy.

(But since no one else has thought to suggest this... am I talking out of my hat?)

No, you're exactly right, Hunter Rose. Kelly was considered the nice one that season, iirc.

I agree that Colby was essential to the Tina/Keith game, but I don't think he "ran" the game, per se. He was a loyal vote for Tina, and he kept immunity away from people who could have thrown a wrench into the Tina/Keith works, but I don't think he made most of the post-merge decisions about who to vote off. I think he either went along with what Tina told him to, or was out of the loop.



Yeah, I'm not that familiar with that season, so I don't remember particularly well. But I suspect that most of his more annoying remarks were saved for his confessionals. My impression was that people thought he was a weirdo and a blowhard, but an all right guy. I am happy to be corrected by those of you who've seen the season more recently.

Eh... I think actually that Hatch was viewed in a pretty negative light by his fellow contestants. We have Sue's infamous (and utterly fabulous) snakes and rats speech, with Rich as the snake; and, IIRC, the former Pagong blamed him for the whole alliance concept. (Which is not an unfounded accusation, of course, but I am one of those people who, while thinking Hatch is pretty much a vile dillweed in real life, and would run away screaming should he approach me on the street, I gotta give him props for essentially creating the currently practiced Survivor strategizing. I'll admit, the concept of an forging an alliance in a game such as Survivor is not exactly rocket science, and if it hadn't have been him, someone else would have eventually made that the de facto mode of gameplay; however, I give props where props are due, and Hatch- IMO, at least- really made Survivor what it is today.) (Plus, he was fun to watch. I love me some Machiabelly.)


I would agree that Amanda was the 'sweetheart'; however, I would modify Peih-Gee and Courtney as either 'female villain' or 'bitch'. Because while (most- there are, of course, exceptions) men portrayed as villains on the show are- while obviously vilified- seen as players worthy of if not person-to-person respect, then game respect; Courtney and Peih-Gee, IMO, were presented as bitches and connivers and 'unworthy'.

For example: despite the fact that both Courtney and Peih-Gee won more IICs than China's SuperDude, the Incredible James, much is made of James athleticism and challenge prowess, while Peih-Gee's far more impressive challenge performances are- from what I have seen/read- never mentioned outside of the TWoP recaps/boards.

Though one of the parts of broad categories like "hero/villain" or "sweetheart/tramp" is that they are both broad and subjective. It's not hard to place anyone into those boxes (add in for men "powerful/plotter"), which is probably why these distinctions work so well for high-school essay assignments. Add in a identity politics spin and it's a pretentious college essay. Yawn.

It would be nice for someone without much else to do to take every contestant and statisitcally see if any class/gender issues really impact outcome, or if it's all a version of finding the conclusions that match what you already believe. Heck, you could even probably publish that in a quality sociology journal.

The problems, I think, would be that 1.) the sample size here is extremely small. For example, you couldn't even really do an analysis on the performance of pageant veterans, because there have been, at the most, only three of them. 2.) There are so many other factors involved in a single game that I think it would be impossible to isolate class/gender from other components such as alliance members, intelligence of other players, game twists (such as the Outcast twist, which added a new "sociological" component), personality, "meta" dynamics (Gary disliking Steph while Cindy adored her), etc. Also, 3.) it is somewhat difficult to compare players/strategies from season to season. For example, both Amber and Becky were accused, by some, of "riding the coattails" of a strong, strategically smart B. Rob and Yul. Both women were seen as reasonably pleasant, well-liked, friendly tribemates. Amber won and Becky did not. Obviously, for multiple other reasons, all of which would confuse the survey.

Just my two cents, not that I am unwilling to see anyone try.

I've got fairly extensive spreadsheets on all the seasons/survivors so far, so if anyone out there knows how to do regression analysis or is better at statistics than I am, contact me and I'll be happy to share the data.

Edited so I don't double post:

Interesting tidbit I just found out. Ami, the seemingly militant lesbian, is actually bisexual. I wonder if her militant pro-female stance on Vanuatu was more a result of the tribal split by sex, and if a mixed tribe would have led to a mixed alliance?

She seems to be getting along fine with guys on the new season.

I don't really think her pro-girl-alliance had anything to do with being either a lesbian OR bisexual. I think it has to do with her brand of what she considers feminism. I don't think it was, "I like to have sex with women, so I should make an alliance with them." I mean, the women were separate to begin with, so it wasn't even getting the women together; it was just keeping the women together, as people often try to keep tribes together.

I also remember from that season that Ami said she wanted a final four a females, because it's never been done before; also, just to show that women can stick together/be in an alliance.

There hasn't been a final four of all men, either. In fact, there hasn't been a final 3 of all men, so the women of Marquesas have the men beat in that aspect. (Granted, the F3 in S4 only arrived there through the PROD and not by all-female alliances, but still, there hasn't been a F3 of just men.)

And there's only been one F2 of all men, while we've had 3 all female F2s.

Miss Alli, I actually agree with you. Maybe it's the editing of the show (imagine!), but Ami seemed so intent on an all female alliance, and she kept referring to it as such. Again, she doesn't seem to have any issue with men this season, which favourably changes my opinion of her.

For the record, I'd have a problem with a purely gender-driven alliance no matter which gender it was, just as I'd have a problem with a race-based alliance. Tribal, no problem.

And since switching to an F3, females have gotten a whopping 3 votes total compared with 20 (or 22, I can't recall if Fiji had a jury a 7 or 9) votes for men.

Since we've had an F3, there have been 5 men and 4 women. Of the 5 men, 3 have received votes. Of the 4 women, 2 have received votes. It's such a small sample size we really can't make anything of it, IMHO. (And it's been 22 votes, Fiji was a 9 person jury.)

I thought it was interesting that Amanda and Parvati both described their romantic situations with a strange, almost apologetic tone. Amanda in particular seems ashamed, a vibe I didn't get from Ozzy. I think both women may be reacting to what I often notice, which is that women with a flirtatious/romantic connection to a man are often dismissed, ridiculed and/or punished for that relationship (whether it be by fellow contestants, Jeff Probst, production, general fan reaction or a combination), much more so than the men in the relationship.

In my opinion it's a reaction linked to not only gender roles but also to Amber's win in Survivor All-Stars.

And then of course Mary, fliratiously linked with Mikey B in tonights episode, was voted off. Not because of her (she seemed to barely matter to the story or to the tribe) but because of Mikey B. It's yet another thing that annoys me about this game the longer it goes on, and it is the seemingly increasing amount of women who are just tools for men (the real protagonists) to get further in the game. Sometimes they're cute and likable (see Michelle), sometimes a little bitchy (Courtney) and sometimes they're barely even on screen (Becky), but they're usually all just there in the background helping their favorite guy play.

I would like a female protagonist. I think that's another reason why I really respond to Cirie.