In juxtaposition, Roxane uses the character Countess Olenska to highlight how women who defied social conventions, walked out of terrible marriages, and remained independent are identified as unlikable. According to Roxane, women such as Wakefield who are getting good grades in school, make the right choices and sacrifices her happiness at the expense of others meet the threshold of likability, an aspect that Roxane detests immensely. For instance, Roxane uses the character, Elizabeth Wakefield, in Sweet Valley High, to demonstrate how society expects women to remain likable. In the essay, Roxane uses fictional characters in the selected works, a typical attribute of a feminist, to juxtapose how different female characters either strove to attain the likability threshold or defied all the social norms and dictates that confines females within the traditional scope of how women should carry themselves. In the essay, Roxane objects the existing social conventions and prescriptions about what likability entails.
In the essay, Roxane examines the concept of likeability of women based on the depiction of different characters in the selected fictional works such as in films and novels.
