This should probably be in another section since its more gender rather then tie up related but the whole damsel in distress thing isn't completely removed from tie ups(quite the opposite) and more people will see it here so this is where i'm placing it.
The damsel in distress trope is probably one of the best known there is, featuring in stories from back before year zero up to this very day. I can't think of any kid who hasn't been told bedtime stories about the brave prince rescuing his distressed girlfriend from the evil wizard or something to that effect.
Damsels in distress have been done to death. If the story is about a brother and sister the sister will get captured, same if a story has two protagonists, one male and one female. If a story is featuring a large group one of the females has a high chance to get taken hostage and so on. I think most well known fictional woman from the last century have been damsels at one point or another.
In lots of story its still being used as a nice plot device to raise the stakes. ''Quickly! we need to show everyone its getting dangerous! lets have someone steal his girlfriend!''
I suppose its easy to understand the reasons behind it . Most writers in the past where male and most stories are made for a male audience. Aside from raising the stakes a bit of fan service is rarely frowned on and if your sure the biggest part of your readers are male it becomes very easy to figure out which character you will let the villains use their ballgag on.
Lately however with the Feminists having risen quite some years ago and with society becoming more or less equal between the genders (Not there yet but progress is being made) the concept of damsels have become a subject of discussion. Not much discussion but wheter or not woman should be the automatic helpless victims in any scenario is being talked about. The two best knows female characters and damsels of their medium Princess peach and Zelda for example are more and more expected to become ''one of the guys'' One of them even getting a chance to reverse the roles.
So what do you think? Is the whole helpless victim thing no longer for this day and age? Is it inherently wrong to expect the heroine to always play second fiddle and damsel in distress to the hero? Do you like or dislike the concept?