Feminism in Gibson’s Neuromancer Regarded as the beginning of the “cyberpunk” movement, William Gibson’s classic novel Neuromancer, confronts the pronounced societal issues of feminism of the time. By distorting the female traits of his characters, Gibson illustrates that gender equality is only achieved when the female persona is able to transform away from both the desired and rejected feminist attributes imposed by societies fixed gender roles. Although the Cyberpunks are almost always male, Gibson’s portrayal of the female character, Molly, is quite rare and illustrates the perceptions of women during the time.
Quite opposite to the soft and gentle woman Case marries and settles down with, Molly is depicted as a hard assassin and bodyguard. Gibson demonstrates that society is traditionally male dominated as women “stay at home” while men are able to explore the frontiers of technology. The juxtaposition of the “stable” and maternal-like woman a man would typically marry, depicts Molly’s nature as defying the status quo by taking on the masculine association of technology demonstrating the exploration of a woman living in a man’s world.
The cyberpunk movement explores the link between human and machines, as seen in the descriptions of Molly which portray the interconnection of the embodiment of humans and machines to depict the role of technology and gender. If cyberpunks are typically male and embrace technology, then in order for Molly to transcend her own gender she must embody technology as Gibson illustrates through her physical characteristics. She is described “look[ing] artificial” with her eyes replaced with mirror like “silver lenses seem[ing] to grow from smooth pale skin above her cheekbones,” (Gibson, 24).
Defying the weaker stereotypical female character, Gibson shows that Molly has to be physically changed to give her the needed strength to overcome her gender limitations. There is optimism though as the ability for Molly to not merely survive, but thrive in this cyberpunk world seems to illustrate the possible success of women in a high-tech world. Molly’s accumulation of technological tools to morph her physical body to more machine-like features demonstrate technology serves as means of protection as well as necessary tools for survival in this male world.
Molly uses technology to shield her eyes, asserting protection of her “soul,” her humanity, assumed by the popular imagery of the eyes being the “window to the soul. ” Molly’s sacrifice for the enhanced masculinized realms of vision is further pronounced in her interactions between Case and Rivera, two male figures never able to capture true gaze. By refusing to allow neither Case nor Rivera the ability to gaze into her eyes, she is protecting the very aspect of her humanity and refuses to allow her male counterparts, the ability to take this from her or suppress of her true nature.
For Rivera, her impenetrable mirrors are particularly problematic because his strengths are based upon the very idea of visual trickery. Rivera’s desire to see himself in Molly’s eyes to represent his desire to control Molly, and his frustration in only seeing himself reflected by her lenses leads to her capture by 3Jane Tessier-Ashpool. This ultimately causes Rivera to smash one of her mirror shades in a desperate attempt to see the color of her eyes, illustrating the gender anxiety felt by Rivera as a result of the removal of the sensual trait of a woman’s eyes by Molly’s mirrored lenses.
Rivera feels his masculinity is threatened by Molly’s unwillingness to subject herself to his masculine gaze nor will she allow him to grasp through her eyes the essence of her true being. Rivera’s anger is paralleled by Case, as he too struggles to command Molly’s gaze or to keep her in his grasp. In their first encounter, Molly stalks Case but he is unable to see her, “behind sailors in short-sleeved khaki. Dark hair, mirrored glasses, dark clothing, slender…And gone” (Gibson 14). Later, escaping her by jumping from a window, Case looks up and “a head appeared…. acklit by the fluorescents in the corridor, then vanished. It returned, but he still couldn’t read the features” (Gibson 18). In the final scenes, Neuromancer comments on Case’s visual failure by saying “he never saw Molly again” (Gibson 271). This final commentary is critical because it reveals that though intimate with Molly, Case is only able to see the outline of her existence, but never expose her actual being hidden behind her lenses. However, it is during the simstim scenes, that Case’s ocular frustration becomes truly visible.
In one scene Molly “was moving through a crowded street, past stalls vending discount software… For a few frightened seconds he fought helplessly to control her body” (Gibson 56). Though Case is able to see through Molly’s eyes he is still unable to control her, rather she controls him by exposing his vulnerability as a result of only allowing only her view not what he chooses. This represents that though forced to become the embodiment of a male, Molly is able to utilize her female strengths to maintain control though physically sacrificed to the opposing sex.
Later, Case comments on her control by saying, “he began to find the passivity of the situation irritating” (Gibson 56). Cases mirrors Rivera’s feeling of being threatened when in simstim scene because though experiencing through Molly, Case is unable to suppress her mind or control her body, taking away his masculine empowerment. In both cases, Gibson illustrates that it through the simple augmentation of covering her eyes that Molly is able to maintain control over the male’s characters by not allowing them to dominate her ultimately demonstrating her ability to achieve equality beyond any kind of biologically restricted spectrum.
While technology can literally “shield” Molly, technology is also a conduit for survival. Molly seems to blur the distinctions between humans and machines as Case mentions that she has no fingerprints, and that her DNA is unrecognizable within her blood stream. Molly’s lack of fingerprints represents the modification of her primitive blueprints that define all human beings, and therefore, the modification of Molly into a more machine-like persona. A modification, as Case notes, that is indistinguishable.
As seen by her “mirrored shades” and use of technology, Molly seeks not to change her true nature, but only her physical aspects to gain physical roles, like her profession, assassination, a traditionally male role. It could be argued that Gibson is attempting to test the extent to which one gender ends and the other begins through the morphing of Molly (female) into machine (male). In the act of removing all traces from Molly’s DNA, Gibson is directly transforming Molly into neither female nor male being.
The placement of her augmentations highlight those areas that Molly is willing to sacrifice facets of her identity, and where she is not. Her mirrored glasses suggest she is protecting her true nature, her feminism, and that perhaps Molly is willing to sacrifice her body because the only separation between male and female is one’s place in the workforce. That is why all of the features she integrates are merely to help her improve her abilities as an assassin.
She has placed her profession at a higher value than her innate, natural identity and Molly indirectly becomes a third sex that is able to use the characteristics of female mentality adjoined with male physicality to become more capable than any male counterpart. Yet it is key to note, that Molly is “more capable” and not depicted as less capable with the addition of her female characteristics highlighting that her feminine qualities are assets that even men cannot have, which is why Rivera is constantly attempting to see her eyes and possess what makes him feel vulnerable.
The added augmentations ranging from enhancement of her eyesight through mirrored lenses or an alteration of her nervous system all provide her with heightened reactions or perceptions allowing her more able to cope with any challenge given. By portraying Molly as not only equal to her male counterparts, but more capable, Gibson begins to unveil the idea that it is only through changing her actual being that a female character can achieve any equality with the male sex. In order to defy all gender limitations, one needs the best of both male and female attributes.
It is the attributes that are the result of body augmentations that make Molly recognizable, not her true being. Yet, although Molly has lost her fingerprints and metaphorically her gender, her body still remains revealing that despite her tremendous attempts to transcend her gender through her actions and emotions, she can never transcend her own physical body into her male counterpart. Gibson stresses that although Molly may attempt to be male, her body will always limit her. We can also see this through Molly’s history as a prostitute or what is referred to in Freeside as a “meat puppet. The very name itself portrays that women in this occupation are of value for nothing more than the flesh they provide for their users. Though this is in essence a crude description of what a prostitute truly is, the contrast between Molly’s current profession and her past occupation demonstrates the importance of her physicality in both, whether as the dominated or dominant. In the brothel where she was employed, Molly tells Case that all the prostitutes were equipped with a “cut-out-chip” allowing their conscience lies in a dream state while working (Gibson 147).
Once entered into the dream state, the people in charge of the “Puppet Parlor” would then be able to activate the “software” that operates the prostitutes body (Gibson 147). Molly describes her prostitution as “free money. Wake up sore, sometimes, but that’s it. Renting goods, is all” (Gibson 147). However, the simplicity of Molly’s statement is counteracted by the implications that the chip strips a woman of her mind, and as Gibson indirectly portrayed as the strength of the female gender.
Illustrating such a disturbing image, Gibson asserts the view that without a mind women are truly just “meat puppets” for others to play with and therefore lose all importance in society. Gibson acknowledges the idea that women are tied to their bodies in ways that men are not. Molly’s description of her past provides interesting insights into the boundaries of gender roles. As see from the “Puppet Parlor,” women do not require any “computer hardware” to interface with the Net.
All she has to do is dream cyberspace and their bodies have special electronic awareness, whereas men have to use electronic “decks” to interface with the Net. Molly and females are already, in essence a part of the Net whereas men are not. This emphasizes further that females do have a type of mystical space and females have direct access to it, whereas men do not. This cyberspace is inherently feminine and a metaphor for a woman’s body. Women are nevertheless always tied to their bodies and can never move through cyberspace as a disembodied gaze that sees from a objective standpoint like Case.
A fascinating contrast evolves when we see that Case does find himself in a male body when the “god-like” Artificial Intelligences are trying to communicate with him, but different from Molly and women, during these encounters Cases body and his brainwaves seem to “flatline” as though he is dead. For men, having a body seems to imply death, while for women it implies life. When Case has a virtual body, he is ultimately under the control of the AI and has no real agency or ability to move in cyberspace because this is the women’s domain.
Technology seems to be used not only as a tool of liberation for Molly to transcend her own identity, but oppression as illustrated by Molly’s mirrored implants redirect her tear ducts into her mouth resulting in her tears to be swallowed rather than shown. Although technology may change her physically, it cannot take away her emotions, her true nature, and therefore she attempts hides it. This is emphasized through Molly’s previous career as a “meat puppet” we can see that women had to activate their “cut out chips” (technology) to remove their minds from being physically overtaken and manipulated.
Gibson’s image of Molly as a “meat puppet” illustrates the idea of what feminists call “objectivity. ” Feminists believe that when “objectification occurs, a person is depersonalized (analogized by technology) so that no individuality or integrity is available socially or in what is an extremely circumscribed privacy. Objectification is an injury right at the heart of discrimination: those who can be used as if they are not fully human are no longer fully human in social terms; their humanity is hurt by being diminished” (Dworkin 89-90).
Her career as a prostitute evaluated by Dworkin’s stance, illustrates Molly’s initial stages of removing her female or human attributes in the persistence to find gender equality. In the book Feminism Without Illusions, Elizabeth Fox-Genovese aligns with Dworkin on the idea that “radical feminism opposes prostitution on the grounds that it degrades women and furthers the power politics of the male gender”( Fox-Genovese 91). However, from a completely opposite prospective, Liberal Feminism believe that the approval of prostitution is dependent on the woman’s reasoning behind her choice to participate in this sexually exploited occupation.
Valenti states that “thing like sex work or stripping can be empowering, because it’s subversive or because hey, it’s fun. We’re making the choice to participate; therefore, it’s powerful” (Valenti 163). Such third Wave feminist ideals can be supported by Molly’s actions because Molly tells Case that the “puppet parlor’ was an effective way to pay for the “costs to go to Chiba, [and] the costs to get the surgery” (Gibson 147). In this sense by allowing her body to become the object or sexual desires in order to pay for augmentations, suggest a more empowered Liberal feminist reading.
Yet, it is the idea that women were not given a choice in what was done to their bodies that creates difficulty in viewing Molly’s previous occupation as empowering or inhumane. It is clear that Molly chose to enter the occupation of a “meat puppet”; however, she was not informed of nor had the choice in how her body was used. Molly reveals to Case that due to inference from her reflex alterations; her “cut-out chip” was deactivated causing her to wake while engaged with a customer, finding that he had used her to murder another woman, and the engage in sex afterward.
Sent into a rage, Molly then killed the man resulting in a contract for her life. In this scene, the opposing feminists views of ‘objectivity’ is put into question, because Molly did agree to have her body used as an object of sex, but not as a weapon to murder with. By killing both a woman and man, Molly strays away from the ideas of Third wave feminists and aligns with more conservatives feminists because even those she needed money this is not sufficient to make such use permissible because she indirectly gave up her humanity along with her body.
By including the consequences of Molly’s actions, Gibson illustrates the linkage between body and mind, as well as asserting his belief that without the mind the body is weak and easily manipulated. Though Gibson portrays Molly as more successful than her male counterparts, her history of lack of control of her body and her necessity to sacrifice her innate being to overcome her female nature, demonstrates Gibson’s conformity to the idea that science fiction is biased toward men.
However, Gibson illustrates Molly’s weaknesses are included in the novel to demonstrate that though she rejects her gender, she still human. By demonstrating that it is only by surgically enhancing herself and rejecting feminist characteristics imposed by fixed gender roles, Gibson ultimately asserts through the character Molly, the impossibility of gender equality within the “cyberpunk” movement.
