Revisiting Princess Peach

On August of 2013, I wrote a blog entry on Princess Peach, where I made the argument that she isn't so much an object for Mario to rescue as much as she is a fairly realistic depiction of a brave woman in a hostage situation. A link here: http://vidgameanalysis.blogspot.com/2013/08/princess-peach-versus-feminism-is.html. However, when I shared that blog with a Facebook group I've long since abandoned, I was accused of being sexist, idiotic, and cherry picking. In hindsight, I should have really known better than to share a blog entry with a Facebook group that had become little more than an echo chamber for Third Wave feminism, atheism, and champagne socialism, but hindsight is 20/20. However, a mod from that group said something that had stuck in me ever since: "I didn't find much argument." And I asked myself, did I really make an argument? Since then, I've taken many moments to read and re-read my entry, and I said to myself "I can do better." And that's what today's blog is all about: a second analysis of Princess Peach and her role in the Mario games.

Princess Peach versus feminism- is the Princess as bad as they claim?

Feminists hate her. She's the quintessential damsel in distress. She's weak, can't fight very well, extremely girly, blonde, and wears a lot of pink. She's Princess Peach. 

And upon seeing this, the feminists reading my blog have just puked in their mouths.

We've all heard the criticisms. "Peach is anti feminist because she has no character", "Peach is the ultimate example of a weak woman." To be sure, no one can ever claim that Peach is a feminist icon. When you get down to it, Peach is a distressed damsel, someone that needs to be rescued (constantly). You can make the claim that this is harmful to women in gaming, and honestly, that's not entirely wrong. A character that is constantly getting kidnapped does seem weak, and to have her be not just a female, but also the major female character in a series that otherwise lacks them, it doesn't look good. But! We also need to take a step back and look at things from a wider perspective.