Elves and fridgehorror in OotS

[krossbow]

As we've seen so far in the order of the stick comic, Its incredibly hard for Female elves to be told apart from male elves; they are, to put it bluntly, apparently flat, and they apparently are not paradigms of Human beauty;.


Conversely, Hilgya is instantly recognizable as female, and on sight easily seen to be have numerous human characteristics normall assigned to females.


Adding all these together, logic dictates that Dwarven woman are more feminine and (apparently) beautiful than Elven woman.

[MoonCat]

Lirian would like to have a word with you. :smallwink:

Also, what's so fridge horror about that?

[Gift Jeraff]

There are at least 3 nameless elves in SoD with breasts like Lirian's.

I wouldn't be surprised if gender ambiguity varied by subrace.

[krossbow]

Lirian would like to have a word with you. :smallwink:

Also, what's so fridge horror about that?


Dwarven woman being more feminine than elven woman is a paradox :smalltongue: Its like the order universe is dividing by zero.

[ORione]

Dwarven woman being more feminine than elven woman is a paradox :smalltongue: Its like the order universe is dividing by zero.

Eh, it doesn't really horrify me.

[MoonCat]

Dwarven woman being more feminine than elven woman is a paradox :smalltongue: Its like the order universe is dividing by zero.

How the heck is it a paradox? :smallconfused:

I'll take it you don't mean paradox as in the actual meaning or paradox, but I don't get it. The only difference between a Dwarven woman and a human woman wearing similar armor is height, but that has nothing to do with femininity. Or are female dwarves not typically considered feminine because they're short?

[krossbow]

How the heck is it a paradox? :smallconfused:

I'll take it you don't mean paradox as in the actual meaning or paradox, but I don't get it. The only difference between a Dwarven woman and a human woman wearing similar armor is height, but that has nothing to do with femininity. Or are female dwarves not typically considered feminine because they're short?


Dwarven woman in fantasy are often described as having full beards, being of duplicate body shape as males, and generally lacking most (or any) of the general characteristics of the human female. This was the source of the joke in the Two towers movie and in the original Dungeons and dragons movie about Dwarven woman and beards. (as an addendum, even in early days of Warcraft, dwarven woman were described as possessing beards and being difficult to tell apart from the men, prior the MMO's prettying them up). It has nothing to do with height but Body hair and body shape.

Elven woman on the other hand in most mediums are described as generally being supernaturally beautful by human standards (including breast size); Dwarven woman (at least in early fantasy days) were depicted as being ultra lacking in femininity while Elven woman possessed ultra feminity. I am pointing out the fact that this fairly long established paradigm is inverted, hence the paradoxical nature. Its similiar to having an icecube be hot while fire is cold in the universe.

[Flame of Anor]

Dwarven woman in fantasy are often described as having full beards, being of duplicate body shape as males, and generally lacking most (or any) of the general characteristics of the human female. This was the source of the joke in the Two towers movie and in the original Dungeons and dragons movie about Dwarven woman and beards. (as an addendum, even in early days of Warcraft, dwarven woman were described as possessing beards and being difficult to tell apart from the men, prior the MMO's prettying them up). It has nothing to do with height but Body hair and body shape.

Elven woman on the other hand in most mediums are described as generally being supernaturally beautful by human standards (including breast size); Dwarven woman (at least in early fantasy days) were depicted as being ultra lacking in femininity while Elven woman possessed ultra feminity. I am pointing out the fact that this fairly long established paradigm is inverted, hence the paradoxical nature. Its similiar to having an icecube be hot while fire is cold in the universe.

Note: dwarf women have beards in Tolkien, too, it just doesn't really come up in LotR.

[FujinAkari]

What in the world makes you think Elven Women are not distinguishable from Elven Men? We have a lot of evidence otherwise, in fact there are at most two cases in the entire comic of those which are ambiguous, neither of which were intentional but more developed from an inside joke (Remember, V was intended to be unambiguously male, but when there was some confusion Rich decided to make it ambiguous)

[MoonCat]

What in the world makes you think Elven Women are not distinguishable from Elven Men? We have a lot of evidence otherwise, in fact there are at most two cases in the entire comic of those which are ambiguous, neither of which were intentional but more developed from an inside joke (Remember, V was intended to be unambiguously male, but when there was some confusion Rich decided to make it ambiguous)

Actually, The Giant has never revealed what V was originally intended to be, just that V was intended to be something before he ran with the ambiguity thing.

[FujinAkari]

Actually, The Giant has never revealed what V was originally intended to be, just that V was intended to be something before he ran with the ambiguity thing.

While technically correct, Rich has said, quite explicitly, that the "V-man" reference in Comic #9 (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0009.html) was what caused the forumites to begin talking about gender and their preconceptions of Gender. Until then he had always had a specific gender in mind and never thought to make it vague.

While, technically, he never said what gender that was, it's pretty hard to think it was female :P

[Dr.Epic]

Lirian would like to have a word with you. :smallwink:

Yeah. It's just V and V's mate as part of a running gag.

[zimmerwald1915]

Dwarven woman in fantasy are often described as having full beards, being of duplicate body shape as males, and generally lacking most (or any) of the general characteristics of the human female. This was the source of the joke in the Two towers movie and in the original Dungeons and dragons movie about Dwarven woman and beards. (as an addendum, even in early days of Warcraft, dwarven woman were described as possessing beards and being difficult to tell apart from the men, prior the MMO's prettying them up). It has nothing to do with height but Body hair and body shape.
Actually, in OOTS we've seen dwarf women both with and without beards. Hilgya had no beard, both when we see her in the Dungeon of Dorukan and in her flashbacks to her time with Ivan in the Dwarven Lands, though it's possible she could have shaved to be iconoclastic. Meanwhile, in SoD we see a bearded dwarf woman billed as a Bearded Lady freak show, and the audience reacts as though they've been cheated, the assumption being that the audience expected dwarf women to be bearded by default.

Meanwhile we've seen elf women run the gamut of secondary sexual characteristics as they've been translated into stick figure style, from the human-with-pointy-ears look of Lirian and her cohorts, to the rounded posterior but flat chest of Team Peregrine's Lieutenant, to the lacking-any-identifying-marks Vaarsuvius (assuming V's female).

[Gift Jeraff]

Considering how much she loathed the dwarven lifestyle, Hilgya probably isn't a good example of typical dwarven women.

[Flame of Anor]

Perhaps there are no dwarf women, and dwarves just spring out of holes in the ground. (Hilgya was a cosplayer.)

[ThePhantasm]

Perhaps there are no dwarf women, and dwarves just spring out of holes in the ground.

Ha ha ha ha of course that would be ridiculous.

[Ancalagon]

Note: dwarf women have beards in Tolkien, too, it just doesn't really come up in LotR.

Where is that said? Is there some source from Tolkien that proofs that?

So far the "Dwarven Women have beards and look like the men" is a parody from the Pratchett-books. Does anyone actually know a original, serious work of fantasy where dwarven women have beards and are otherwise indistinguishable from the males?

I must say I do not know one, which would make the Pratchett books to be a parody of something that never occurred anywhere...

edit: Never mind, found some Tolkien source. Dwarves there have beards from birth... both genders.

[hewhosaysfish]

Adding all these together, logic dictates that Dwarven woman are more feminine and (apparently) beautiful than Elven woman.

Even if we accept the premises, the conclusion doesn't necessarily follow.

If male and female elves are equally feminine, and female dwarves are more feminine than male dwarves...

Elves (male and female alike) could be more feminine than female dwarves, less feminine than male dwarves or more than males but less than females.

Assuming, of course, that femininity is a simple and linear mumerical scale. :smalltongue:

[Solaris]

So this is where all of the incredibly lame, not at all disturbing examples of 'horror' on TV Tropes come from.

[SPoD]

Considering how much she loathed the dwarven lifestyle, Hilgya probably isn't a good example of typical dwarven women.

Yeah, this. Maybe the fact that she shaves makes her particularly alluring or beautiful, which would explain Durkon falling for her so hard.

Like how human women naturally CAN grow hair hair on their legs, armpits, etc., but many (most?) choose to shave it to appear more feminine. Technically, there's nothing biologically more feminine about being hairless in those areas, but that's how standards of beauty have evolved.

[Dvandemon]

So this is where all of the incredibly lame, not at all disturbing examples of 'horror' on TV Tropes come from.

Now we need to just find and delete them

I think people just want to bring something up on the main subject page but don't know how

[Blisstake]

Fridge horror?

What does this have to do with refridgerators? :smallconfused:

[ORione]

Perhaps there are no dwarf women, and dwarves just spring out of holes in the ground. (Hilgya was a cosplayer.)

We can ask Durkon if Hilgya is female or not...

[TheSummoner]

Elf men and women being indistinguishable doesn't make the Elf women any less feminine... Just makes the Elf men moreso.

[Flame of Anor]

Fridge horror?

What does this have to do with refridgerators? :smallconfused:

It's a derivation of the term "Fridge Logic". Go to TvTropes.org for more, but basically fridge logic is when you're watching something and you get up for a drink from the kitchen, and just when you get to the fridge you think Waaaaiiiit a second--that doesn't make sense! And fridge horror is when the thing you realize is horrifying.

[MoonCat]

It's a derivation of the term "Fridge Logic". Go to TvTropes.org for more, but basically fridge logic is when you're watching something and you get up for a drink from the kitchen, and just when you get to the fridge you think Waaaaiiiit a second--that doesn't make sense! And fridge horror is when the thing you realize is horrifying.

And while you're right, this isn't really fridge horror at all. Or a paradox.

[ORione]

At most it's Fridge Logic, and I don't really see that either, for reasons that have been listed.

[The Pilgrim]

While, technically, he never said what gender that was, it's pretty hard to think it was female :P

Oh, come on, Rich assigned PINK as the magic-signature color for V back in the first panel of the FIRST strip. Not that you can't assing pink to a male, but traditional color-sex conventions mean it's FAR more probable that Rich assigned pink to V because he thought V originally as a female.

Not to mention V and Haley were shown engaged in girly talk at the begining of Strip #3. Which brings in the issue that, from a storytelling perspective, it's better to have 2 girls in a 6-people party than just one. That way you can exploit puns and situations that require the presence or/and the interaction of two female characters. In the comic, V has served plenty of times in the role of a female for such purposes.

Not to mention a trillion other points, like the fact that "man" is a neuter word.

Really, it would be fine if people stopped trying to shove that "V was originally intended to be a male" in every discussion like if it was a fact, when it's not.

[The Pilgrim]

Adding all these together, logic dictates that Dwarven woman are more feminine and (apparently) beautiful than Elven woman.

Or, on the other hand, logic dictates that Elven men are more affeminate than Dwarven men, thus making it hard to tell them apart from the females.

Which, by the way, is the conclussion that led to the running gag about elves that has been around since, like, fantasy-role-playing was born.

[Flame of Anor]

Not to mention V and Haley were shown engaged in girly talk at the begining of Strip #3.

It's only Haley who is girly-talking. "A most grave conundrum you faced" is hardly girly-talk. They were just two friends talking, one of which is a girl and one of which we don't know.

[MoonCat]

Either way it doesn't matter, since the Giant may have changed it since then, and we'll never know.

[le Suisse]

Technically, Elves can live centuries without aging, but dwarves can only live 300 years and are aging fast (at least they look old). So, elves don't need a lot hormones for their reproduction, because they can have children anytime (but it's rare for they to do that), and dwarves must have children erly in their life.

Because of that, the elves are a litle bit androgyneous, sometime.

I still don't know why it's so horrific, though.

[Flame of Anor]

Not to mention V and Haley were shown engaged in girly talk at the begining of Strip #3.

It's only Haley who is girly-talking. "A most grave conundrum you faced" is hardly girly-talk. They were just two friends talking, one of which is a girl and one of which we don't know.

[FujinAkari]

Really, it would be fine if people stopped trying to shove that "V was originally intended to be a male" in every discussion like if it was a fact, when it's not.

Except it is a fact, or at the very least a necessary logical conclusion.

Fact 1: The V-man comment (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=267672&postcount=46) was the first time people began to discuss what gender Vaarsuvius was.
Fact 2: The Giant was not making the gender ambiguous until people started questioning it after that strip was printed.
Fact 3: The usage of "V-man" when he was -not- trying to be misleading is a very decisively masculine term (as the reactions in the thread show)

Conclusion: V was initially intended to be male.

If you wish to debate this, you better come at me with more than speculation and circumstantial evidence :)

[ORione]

Except it is a fact, or at the very least a necessary logical conclusion.

Fact 1: The V-man comment (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=7333&page=2) was the first time people began to discuss what gender Vaarsuvius was.
Fact 2: The Giant was not making the gender ambiguous until people started questioning it after that strip was printed.
Fact 3: The usage of "V-man" when he was -not- trying to be misleading is a very decisively masculine term (as the reactions in the thread show)

Conclusion: V was initially intended to be male.

If you wish to debate this, you better come at me with more than speculation and circumstantial evidence :)

Fact: The Giant said he won't tell us what gender V is.
Fact: The Giant is the only person IRL who knows V's gender.
Fact: The Giant can retcon V's gender if he feels like it.

Conclusion: This debate is pointless.

[Themrys]

By my definition of "beauty", flat-chested women can be supernaturally beautiful. And that includes the breasts. Thin women with big breasts don't make much sense, anyway. It rarely happens in real life. (without surgery, that is)

I like the androgynous elves in OotS, and I don't see any fridgehorror there. Breast size has nothing at all to do with beauty.

[FujinAkari]

Fact: The Giant said he won't tell us what gender V is.
Fact: The Giant is the only person IRL who knows V's gender.
Fact: The Giant can retcon V's gender if he feels like it.

Conclusion: This debate is pointless.

You must be new to the OOTS forums... pointless debate has never been an obstacle to their continuance :P

Seriously though, you're right. The Giant has now made V ambiguous and (s)he could go either way, but claiming that the INITIAL conception of V wasn't male is to ignore all available evidence. That (s)he started as a man is all but fact at this point.

[MoonCat]

You must be new to the OOTS forums... pointless debate has never been an obstacle to their continuance :P

Seriously though, you're right. The Giant has now made V ambiguous and (s)he could go either way, but claiming that the INITIAL conception of V wasn't male is to ignore all available evidence. That (s)he started as a man is all but fact at this point.

No it isn't, but since it doesn't matter we may as well stop.

[FujinAkari]

No it isn't, but since it doesn't matter we may as well stop.

If you think it isn't, I welcome your argument. Mine is pretty iron-clad.

1) We know, from Rich's commentary in Dungeon Crawlin' Fools that Vaarsuvius started the strip with a definite gender and it wasn't until "an early strip" caused the gender to be debated.
2) We know, from the archives, that that "early strip" was strip #9 (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=267672&postcount=46)
3) We know, from Rich, that Roy's comment (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=267900&postcount=50) in Strip #9 is meant to convey that Roy considers V male.

Thus, if Rich did not consider V's gender to be ambiguous until AFTER Strip #9 was posted (and the forum reacted to it) and we know that the verbiage Roy used in Strip #9 indicated V to be male, then the only logical conclusion was that Rich considered V to be a male character. He may no longer consider V such and has definitely retconned that certainty, but you can't just ignore the facts and claim it was always ambiguous :)

Again, if you wish to contest this, you need to come at me with an actual argument based in evidence.

[Flame of Anor]

By my definition of "beauty", flat-chested women can be supernaturally beautiful. And that includes the breasts. Thin women with big breasts don't make much sense, anyway. It rarely happens in real life. (without surgery, that is)

Unless they're ghosts, I would say they're very naturally, or perhaps preternaturally, beautiful. :smallwink:


You must be new to the OOTS forums... pointless debate has never been an obstacle to their continuance :P

So true.

[SPoD]

2) We know, from the archives, that that "early strip" was strip #9 (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=267672&postcount=46)

We know no such thing. We know that Rich made a comment on it after strip #9, but we have no way of knowing if someone, possibly on another message board, made a comment earlier. Say, back after strip #3, with the "girl talk" episode. When Rich started the strip, he used to post it at several different D&D message boards that he was a member of to get additional feedback/exposure, so people were reading and discussing on other sites right from the beginning.

Note the exact quote from Dungeon Crawlin' Fools:


The character's gender ambiguity was not planned, but after seeing debates among fans on either side of the issue, I decided to take that particular ball and run with it.

Nowhere does he say that the fans were members of HIS forums, nor does he identify the early strip in question. If the strip was #3 instead of #9, the situation is reversed: V was intended to be female, but he included verbiage in #9 to deliberately make it a point of confusion. The post of his you linked is therefore him simply acknowledging publicly what he had decided six strips earlier: That V's gender was ambiguous.


Again, if you wish to contest this, you need to come at me with an actual argument based in evidence.

You don't actually have evidence. You just have supposition that an oblique reference to an event can only refer to the one event you find most "probable." A probability pulled out of thin air. You can't definitively tie the comments to strip #9 just because it's the first time it was mentioned here, on this site, and so you have nothing.

[Mindfreak]

Ha ha ha ha of course that would be ridiculous.

That would make sense. After all, shouldn't Dwarven Women have beards?

[FujinAkari]

We know no such thing. We know that Rich made a comment on it after strip #9, but we have no way of knowing if someone, possibly on another message board, made a comment earlier. Say, back after strip #3, with the "girl talk" episode. When Rich started the strip, he used to post it at several different D&D message boards that he was a member of to get additional feedback/exposure, so people were reading and discussing on other sites right from the beginning.

Nowhere does he say that the fans were members of HIS forums, nor does he identify the early strip in question. If the strip was #3 instead of #9, the situation is reversed: V was intended to be female, but he included verbiage in #9 to deliberately make it a point of confusion. The post of his you linked is therefore him simply acknowledging publicly what he had decided six strips earlier: That V's gender was ambiguous.

This isn't an unsound theory, can you please link to the debate on some other message board that you are referring too? If not, I'm afraid all you really have is speculation and it still won't stand up to evidence.


You don't actually have evidence.

The links seem to indicate otherwise. Unless you (or someone) can produce an earlier point of contention, then there is absolutely no reason to think the debate which Rich refers to precedes the first time the issue was debated on the official forum.

Additionally, your logic does not follow. Rich had decided to make V's gender ambiguous, and so he choose to have a character refer to V in an extremely unambiguous manner?

There are a number of strips that play at the ambiguity and confuse the issue, this is not one of them.

[krossbow]

Why does it seem like every thread will, given a long enough amount of time, turn into a debate on V's gender? :smallconfused:

[SPoD]

This isn't an unsound theory, can you please link to the debate on some other message board that you are referring too? If not, I'm afraid all you really have is speculation and it still won't stand up to evidence.

And if you had evidence, that would be true. You don't. You have speculation, same as me. You just find your own speculation more credible. I don't.

Do I care enough about this to spend my time searching for it? No. Especially since I know that the message board that I first saw Rich posting OOTS on doesn't even exist anymore. Or the conversation could have taken place on this forum but in a separate thread; all other threads from that time period have been purged. Or maybe it was among his personal friends, at his weekly D&D game, in a chatroom, or anywhere. All that would be required would be for there to be two people to discuss it and Rich present to hear it.

The absence of written proof for my theory doesn't make your theory correct by default. You can't prove that he didn't spark that debate elsewhere, because you can't prove a negative. The only defense for that would be a positive statement by Rich where he says, "It was strip #9 that I was talking about." Which you don't have. Without that, neither position is proven or disproven. We just don't have the proper evidence.


The links seem to indicate otherwise.

Not unless you want to interpret them that way. And that's all it can ever be, an interpretation. Not fact.

If you have to use the word seem in relation to your evidence, then you don't have evidence. You have conjecture. Because how something seems to you is not going to be the same as how it seems to someone else. That's called an opinion, not a fact.


Unless you (or someone) can produce an earlier point of contention, then there is absolutely no reason to think the debate which Rich refers to precedes the first time the issue was debated on the official forum.

There is every reason to think it, if one is attempting to actually weigh the facts and not read meaning into statements that may not be there. Especially since in those days, there were MORE readers on other forums than on this one. "Official" means nothing when there are less than 100 people reading your site, but hundreds are reading it somewhere else.

I'm going to PM Rich about this, not because I expect him to answer (I don't), but because him answering is the only possible resolution to this discussion and I have things to do today.

[Gift Jeraff]

The original OOTS discussion thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=7333) has gender discussion starting in response to strip #9 (page 2 on the setting with maximum posts per page), and then Rich says Roy's comment simply means Roy sees V as a male in response to the gender discussion.

That's good enough evidence for me that V was intended to be male (coupled in with the fact that Roy was originally going to be the party wizard), barring the Giant flat-out saying otherwise.

[SPoD]

The original OOTS discussion thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=7333) has gender discussion starting in response to strip #9 (page 2 on the setting with maximum posts per page), and then Rich says Roy's comment simply means Roy sees V as a male in response to the gender discussion.

That's good enough evidence for me that V was intended to be male (coupled in with the fact that Roy was originally going to be the party wizard), barring the Giant flat-out saying otherwise.

Yes, I know, that's the very post we've been discussing.

It's great that it's good enough for you. It's not good enough for me. So I hope we can get the Giant to flat-out say whether or not it was that thread that sparked the idea in his mind.

Let's be clear: I'm not arguing that V is female. I don't know either way. I'm arguing that the evidence being prevented that the Giant MUST have intended him to be male all along is shaky and amounts to conjecture. Is it baseless conjecture? No, it's a very reasonable interpretation to make. But that's all it is, an interpretation. Not case-closed no-reason-to-ever-discuss-it-again evidence as it's being heralded.

[CaptainIreland]

FujinAkari is correct. Spod is grasping at straws.

Nothing more to discuss about it, really. The evidence is clear.

[FujinAkari]

The absence of written proof for my theory doesn't make your theory correct by default.

Yes it does, actually. In a debate, two sides take up a position. My side has supporting evidence, your side does not. Therefore, the lack of support for your "somewhere else" theory necessarily makes it less plausible than the counter-argument which DOES have supporting evidence.


You can't prove that he didn't spark that debate elsewhere, because you can't prove a negative..

Correct, which is why burden of proof exists. It is not my responsibility to prove that Rich didn't see the debate elsewhere, my responsibility is to prove my case, and yours is to prove yours. If you don't want to argue your side, thats fine, but you don't get to argue that my viewpoint isn't valid because you can't find evidence for yours.


I'm going to PM Rich about this, not because I expect him to answer (I don't), but because him answering is the only possible resolution to this discussion and I have things to do today.

Man, leave him alone. He is busy and has things to do. If you don't want to believe that's what happened, that's fine, but it will remain the de facto explanation until someone presents supporting evidence refuting it :)

I also note you didn't address the biggest flaw in your premise: If the Giant introduced the "V-man" reference to spark gender confusion, why did he do it in such a terrible manner? You don't spark confusion by having one character blatantly refer to a character as male and every other character silently agree without comment.

[ThePhantasm]

FujinAkari is correct. Spod is grasping at straws.

Nothing more to discuss about it, really. The evidence is clear.

How is the evidence clear? And how is SPoD grasping at straws by stating that we can't argue with total certainty about this? We don't know the Giant's mind or what was going on at that stage. We don't know explicitly what strip started it all. SPoD stated FujinAkari's case was plausible. It just can't be recited as fact unless we know more. Which we don't.

All the thread cited proves is that Roy thought V was male.

[CaptainIreland]

How is the evidence clear? And how is SPoD grasping at straws by stating that we can't argue with total certainty about this? We don't know the Giant's mind or what was going on at that stage. We don't know explicitly what strip started it all. SPoD stated FujinAkari's case was plausible. It just can't be recited as fact unless we know more. Which we don't.

All the thread cited proves is that Roy thought V was male.

Read FukinAkari's posts. She wins the debate. I really can't state it any better than she has, especially in her most recent post.

Well done, Fujin.

[ThePhantasm]

Read FukinAkari's posts. She wins the debate. I really can't state it any better than she has, especially in her most recent post.

I admit, I like her argument. It would be a lot more sound if this had been the only forum Rich discussed OOTS on since the beginning, and if we had a complete archive of all the threads, and all that. But we don't. It is like saying "this snowball started the avalanche," when there are possibly 30 other snowballs out there that we don't know about. The only person who does know is the Giant.

The way the forum stands now isn't the way it has always been.

[CaptainIreland]

The way the forum stands now isn't the way it has always been.

Just so it doesn't look like I'm ignoring you, I want to make this clear:

I have no intention of arguing either side, here. But Fujin's argument wins over Spod's. I'm not going to argue her side, or whether her argument is valid. Please feel free to do so with her.

All I'm saying is that as the evidence she presented looks vs the evidence Spod presented, she wins.

[FujinAkari]

It just can't be recited as fact unless we know more. Which we don't.

I think you are expecting an unreasonable degree of truth. You are basically stating "This can't be considered correct unless every other theory is proven incorrect." That just isn't the way we live our lives... if it were then we would have to say "The light either turns on because electricity is controlled by the switch on the wall or because space aliens cause it to turn on to make me believe I have control over my life."

I mean, can you PROVE aliens aren't controlling your lamp?

Edit: To put it another way:

Truth is what we -know- to be true, Facts are things which evidence seems to indicate are true. Facts can and do change. When I went to school Paul Revere's midnight ride was factual, but I recently learned that it was actually Israel Bissel, not Paul Revere, who made the ride I was taught about.

As of right now, the accepted explaination is the argument I presented. That doesn't make it written in stone and mean it can never ever change, but unless something beyond conjecture is presented to oppose it, it will remain the accepted explaination.

[MoonCat]

Why does it seem like every thread will, given a long enough amount of time, turn into a debate on V's gender? :smallconfused:

Really? This is one of the few I've seen since I started reading the forums. Sorry about it hijacking your thread though.

[ThePhantasm]

I think you are expecting an unreasonable degree of truth. You are basically stating "This can't be considered correct unless every other theory is proven incorrect." That just isn't the way we live our lives... if it were then we would have to say "The light either turns on because electricity is controlled by the switch on the wall or because space aliens cause it to turn on to make me believe I have control over my life."

I mean, can you PROVE aliens aren't controlling your lamp?

The problem with this line of thought is that I can argue there is an extremely small probability (almost nil) that aliens are controlling my lamp. But we know for a fact that this forum has been through many purges, that Rich posted on other forums in the early days, etc. There's a much higher probability that this all started in some other thread or discussion. We aren't offering up alternative theories for you to prove incorrect, we are calling into doubt the foundational assumption you have made for your argument. Your argument on its own is fine, but no scientific argument is in good standing unless it has analyzed enough of the data. Much of the data has been lost to us, unfortunately. That is why your theory remains at best a theory, and cannot be conclusively decided unless the Giant speaks on the matter.




As of right now, the accepted explaination is the argument I presented. That doesn't make it written in stone and mean it can never ever change, but unless something beyond conjecture is presented to oppose it, it will remain the accepted explaination.

It isn't the accepted explanation, though. Mainly because we have enough data from people's experiences and our knowledge of the early forums to call your theory into reasonable doubt.

[FujinAkari]

It isn't the accepted explanation, though. Mainly because we have enough data from people's experiences and our knowledge of the early forums to call your theory into reasonable doubt.

define "reasonable doubt"

To me, The Giant seeing the confusion at some other location and saying 'Hey, I know, I'll play on this and intentionally make V ambiguous by having Roy call V a man and no one else in the party acting surprised or confused in any way, shape, or form!' is completely unreasonable.

[The Giant]

Man, leave him alone. He is busy and has things to do.

This is so true. And yet...


If you don't want to believe that's what happened, that's fine, but it will remain the de facto explanation until someone presents supporting evidence refuting it :)

Oooo! Oooo! Can I?

The first time I heard someone question whether V was male or female was right after I posted my first strip. A friend of mine asked me about it; at the time, I simply answered. Luckily for me, that friend has not chosen to reveal what I said then to the world.

At the time of the lime green boots strip, there was a thread separate from the main discussion thread where someone said how nice it was to see two women adventurers who were so different from one another as V and Haley. Brief debate followed, but there were very few posters in those days. I don't think it made it to 12 posts.

By the comic with the belt, I was aware enough of the confusion that I had already taken a poll among an IRC gaming group I was in at the time and asked them what gender they thought he/she was, and the results were split: 4 thought V was a woman, 2 thought V was a man. So I decided to swing the perception the other way with my next strip.

Which leads us to...


I also note you didn't address the biggest flaw in your premise: If the Giant introduced the "V-man" reference to spark gender confusion, why did he do it in such a terrible manner? You don't spark confusion by having one character blatantly refer to a character as male and every other character silently agree without comment.

Sure, if you're a good writer. I, on the other hand, was a very very bad writer back then. And also I could not have imagined that my choices (much less my message board posts) would be picked apart like this 8 years later. I thought it would confuse half my 50 or so readers, and that amused me. At the time, that was enough reason to do it. Remember, there was no intent to have any sort of plot until a few strips after that. My post in the thread at the time was my way of acknowledging that I wasn't going to answer the question, nothing more.

My biggest mistake was thinking that the majority-view in my 6-person poll was analogous to what the majority of the readers at the time thought or would think in the future. In hindsight, rather than trying to shift the perception the other way, I should have shifted it toward neutral, as I did in later strips. (Incidentally, it's because I now recognize that it is bad writing to have introduced the ambiguity that way that I am bothering to respond to this. It bugs me that I didn't do it more organically than that, and I don't like anyone using the fact that I was bad at doing something as proof that I must not have meant to do it.)

OK, question asked, answer given.

Now I think I may go answer some other threads randomly, because if I've already opened my mouth and spilled stuff that I'll probably regret later, I might as well do it some more.

[ThePhantasm]

To me, The Giant seeing the confusion at some other location and saying 'Hey, I know, I'll play on this and intentionally make V ambiguous by having Roy call V a man and no one else in the party acting surprised or confused in any way, shape, or form!' is completely unreasonable.

So really your theory hinges on your interpretation of the strip and not on the forum evidence.

Your interpretation might be right, but I don't think that strip in particular proves anything conclusive other than Roy thought V was a male, and none of the characters cared to bring up the issue. And I certainly don't think Rich's comment on the strip decisively proves your point.

EDIT: Ninja'd by the GIANT! Epic.

[Gift Jeraff]

Well, that's that. I guess the missing link to all this was that poll.

And I guess you can add this to your sig, ThePhantasm. :smalltongue:

[Nightmarenny]

...Well that settles that. V's ambiguity predates all references to said ambiguity.

[Narren]

And we STILL don't know if Rich considered him male or female! :smallwink:

[FujinAkari]

Nope, and we never will.

Also: Darn you Rich, I was -this- close to actually WINNING a debate on the OOTS forums. Such a feat has never been achieved! :P

[MoonCat]

And we STILL don't know if Rich considered him male or female! :smallwink:

And we wont, ever. Pity.


Nope, and we never will.

Also: Darn you Rich, I was -this- close to actually WINNING a debate on the OOTS forums. Such a feat has never been achieved! :P

No, not quite, because Phantasm was making good points about us not knowing when the first ambiguity was.

Also, whoa, the Giant posted!

[krossbow]

Really? This is one of the few I've seen since I started reading the forums. Sorry about it hijacking your thread though.


Oh, not accusing anyone of hijacking it; i was just musing about how often that debate springs up :smallbiggrin:


On that note, interesting that the giant took an interest in the thread today XD have to keep an eye out for him posting in other threads as well. :smallamused:

[The Pilgrim]

I'm glad that the "V-Man on strip #9 proves that V was originally intended to be male" argument lies now in ruins.

Thanks, Giant.

Now, returning to the original topic:

The fact that Hylga has a bigger breasts than the average female elf doesn't mean she is more attractive, much less feminine. As an old adage in my country says:
"Boob that thou hand cannot cover, is not a boob, but an udder"

[H Birchgrove]

Thanks Giant. :smallcool:

Now I can keep dreaming V is female. :smallredface: (While knowing that those who prefer as male can do that and that there's no need to fight over it. :smallamused: )


Sure, if you're a good writer. I, on the other hand, was a very very bad writer back then. And also I could not have imagined that my choices (much less my message board posts) would be picked apart like this 8 years later. I thought it would confuse half my 50 or so readers, and that amused me. At the time, that was enough reason to do it. Remember, there was no intent to have any sort of plot until a few strips after that. My post in the thread at the time was my way of acknowledging that I wasn't going to answer the question, nothing more.

My biggest mistake was thinking that the majority-view in my 6-person poll was analogous to what the majority of the readers at the time thought or would think in the future. In hindsight, rather than trying to shift the perception the other way, I should have shifted it toward neutral, as I did in later strips. (Incidentally, it's because I now recognize that it is bad writing to have introduced the ambiguity that way that I am bothering to respond to this. It bugs me that I didn't do it more organically than that, and I don't like anyone using the fact that I was bad at doing something as proof that I must not have meant to do it.)

OK, question asked, answer given.

I actually enjoy when you can see how the creator develops his or her skills. The random (?) joking about D'n'D rules were great fun when I started to read the strip, while the story-arcs have been as good or better than most TV-serials I watch or comic books I read.


...Well that settles that. V's ambiguity predates all references to said ambiguity.

Isn't it awesome? :smallbiggrin:

[Flame of Anor]

The fact that Hylga has a bigger breasts than the average female elf doesn't mean she is more attractive, much less feminine. As an old adage in my country says:
"Boob that thou hand cannot cover, is not a boob, but an udder"

Well, my country's adage says:

"If you use thou when you mean thy, an innocent grammarian fairy will die."

[The Pilgrim]

Well, my country's adage says:

"If you use thou when you mean thy, an innocent grammarian fairy will die."

Groove!!! Can I see the corpse!!!

Killing grammarian fairies; It's everything I dreamt, and more!

[Dancing_Fox]

Groove!!! Can I see the corpse!!!

Killing grammarian fairies; It's everything I dreamt, and more!

Holy cow. You're attempting a massacre, aren't you? :smalleek:



Anyway, in MY country we have a saying . . . no wait, that's not relevant at all to this thread.

[krossbow]

Well, my country's adage says:

"If you use thou when you mean thy, an innocent grammarian fairy will die."


http://almostdumb.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/kill-them-johnny-kill-them-all.jpg

Do not forget though; in the country of the internet, the masses do not care if its an udder or a boob! Only that it is on the personage. :smalltongue:

Though, in seriousness, the existence of "curves" on the upper area is one of the most widely recognized characteristics of an individual being female. Its often used to depict animals or even robots (just look at transformers :smalltongue:) being female, even if at a gag level, hence its importance to conventional ideas of femininity.

[SPoD]

I was pretty sure I had heard the Giant tell that story before, possibly at a convention, but without proof I was just relying on my foggy memory. At least it's in writing now, so no one will ever have to have this exact argument again.

[Dancing_Fox]

I was pretty sure I had heard the Giant tell that story before, possibly at a convention, but without proof I was just relying on my foggy memory. At least it's in writing now, so no one will ever have to have this exact argument again.

You may be entitled to expand your signature:


"Spod has it right, again."


And I forgot in my last post but "Woo-hoo. The Giant posts! And settles an argument!" As well as posting a great comic strip.

[ORione]

Well, my country's adage says:

"If you use thou when you mean thy, an innocent grammarian fairy will die."

That's an awesome saying. Do you mind if I put it in my signature?

[Flame of Anor]

That's an awesome saying. Do you mind if I put it in my signature?

Of course not! :smallbiggrin: