Sexism in Table-Top Gaming: My Thoughts On It, and What We Can Do About It

[GolemsVoice]

No. There are far bigger issues, like how armor changes between males and females.

To be fair, they seem to have mostly done away with that, at least the very drastic and much (and deservedly) ridiculed differences.

[Themrys]

You found the depiction of women as being less bulky than men impossibly offensive?

The armour-changes are worse, but yeah, sexy male night-elves could have distracted me from that, had they existed. I, too, am only human, after all. :smallredface:

The armor was the main issue, I just mentioned the bulky males as additional straw that made me feel not welcome there. They didn't even try to cater to the female gaze.

[Hyena]

To be fair, they seem to have mostly done away with that, at least the very drastic and much (and deservedly) ridiculed differences.
Well... yes and no. There was plenty of non-skimpy armor for women in classic and BC, but now everything is looking reasonable. Unfortunately, the reason for it is that all the armor except for tiers is the same model with different textures.

[Scow2]

Well, that certainly proves me wrong on the "no newer sources" thing, but unfortunately doesn't seem to have changed very much on the "sphinxes are an ugly example of sexist ideas" part.

Well... it's also an exploration of the ramifications of having supernaturally-enforced and quite measurable differences between the genders and subspecies and worthy of examination instead of dismissal, even if they are inspired by stereotypes.

[Frozen_Feet]

Your take on sphinx's personalities is really interesting and I think for a homebrew setting it could work well, but it's not supported by the 1e and 2e monster manuals....

I know things are different in early D&D, I was commenting on the take Scow2 posted earlier in the thread. :smallsmile:

Another possible way to view them would be to apply Von Carstein's matrix, where people can be lazy or diligent, and stupid or smart. The matrix originates from a military context:

Those who are stupid and lazy make for good crew members. They lack drive and ability to lead, but this also means they're unlikely to rebel. You can trust them to follow orders to the letter, because they won't bother to come up with their own interpretations or do anything excessive.

Those who are smart and lazy make for good officers. They are bright enough to formulate over-arching principles and orders, but due to their laziness won't do anything unnecessary. They will delegate implementation of orders to their sergeants and avoid micromanaging, freeing their minds to consider the big picture.

Those who are smart and diligent make for good sergeants. They're bright enough t understand orders of their superiors, and energetic enough to kick themselves and their crew into action, filling in the gaps to achieve both spirit and letter of the orders.

Those who are stupid and diligent should be shot, because if left to their own they will screw everything up by coming up with one unworkable idea after another.

Which Sphinx fits which category?

[TheThan]

So I’ve been reading this thread, so I thought I’d post my thoughts on the subject.
People have what I call “filters”. Filters are simply people’s ability to see what they want to see and ignore the rest. For instance if I post up this pic:


http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g42/TheThan/amazonwarriorwomanwitharmorandswordamazonian_zpsba 3d39ef.jpg (http://s53.photobucket.com/user/TheThan/media/amazonwarriorwomanwitharmorandswordamazonian_zpsba 3d39ef.jpg.html)


Someone may say, something along the lines of “what a sexist picture, she’s in a chainmail bikini!". That shows that individual has his/her sexism filter turned on. Why? Because that person is choosing (whether consciously or not) to see nothing but woman in a chainmail bikini.

Now if someone says something like "what an awesome picture, she’s a powerful warrior that’s adventuring in a dark dungeon”. That person does not have his/her sexism filter turned on and can see past what the subject in the picture is wearing.

I'm not denying that she's wearing a chain mail bikini. I'm just choosing not to focus on that fact.

I guess to sum up sexism is completely subjective. If we choose to view something as sexist, then it is. If we choose to view something as not-sexist then it’s not sexist. So why don’t we all take off our sexism filter for a bit and enjoy gaming at the table; whether your character is wearing a chainmail bikini or full plate.

[Froggie]

The sphinxes seem to follow some of the most common tired stereotypes with the addition of some archetypes found in human social history

Andro: The tragic übermench and the asexual genius. As it is the perfect being it has transcended the need for love or sex and focuses on more important pursuits. Even its power to fix the currently broken system is irrelevant to it because it's either to far above the rest to care or finds it more prudent to let them figure it out themselves. Dr.Manhattan comes to mind, as does Tesla.

The fact that its name, it's physical appearance and its psyche seem to be only favorably presented because its like that of the female I do find rather disturbing.

Crio: The common working man with flaws. Although neutral they can rise above the lot and be good, or they can be bad.

Heiraco: As I don't really know if they're evil from birth or just become that way because they're orphaned it's difficult to assess. If it's the later every part in the system is to blame for their existence (I'm looking at you andro). Either kill them or raise them. Don't just leave them to rot and hope that most of them die.

Gyno: Unlike the males who span the three male pathways: supreme hero ideal, common bystander and hateful villain, the female has only one form. While they can be temperamental they're pretty much the most grounded of the lot. It's pretty much saying that females are good, loving and respectful by default, and only males can be truly bad, stupid or transcendent.

Pretty traditional stuff, and tired as well.

[Scow2]

The sphinxes seem to follow some of the most common tired stereotypes with the addition of some archetypes found in human social history

Andro: The tragic übermench and the asexual genius. As it is the perfect being it has transcended the need for love or sex and focuses on more important pursuits. Even its power to fix the currently broken system is irrelevant to it because it's either to far above the rest to care or finds it more prudent to let them figure it out themselves. Dr.Manhattan comes to mind, as does Tesla.

The fact that its name, it's physical appearance and its psyche seem to be only favorably presented because its like that of the female I do find rather disturbing.

Crio: The common working man with flaws. Although neutral they can rise above the lot and be good, or they can be bad.

Heiraco: As I don't really know if they're evil from birth or just become that way because they're orphaned it's difficult to assess. If it's the later every part in the system is to blame for their existence (I'm looking at you andro). Either kill them or raise them. Don't just leave them to rot and hope that most of them die.

Gyno: Unlike the males who span the three male pathways: supreme hero ideal, common bystander and hateful villain, the female has only one form. While they can be temperamental they're pretty much the most grounded of the lot. It's pretty much saying that females are good, loving and respectful by default, and only males can be truly bad, stupid or transcendent.

Pretty traditional stuff, and tired as well.

Or, instead of trying to take it as commentary on real gender roles, you can take the nature of the beast as a given specific to that beast, and try to extrapolate and figure out how the species functions from there.

[Coidzor]

Women-only monsters are much likelier to have a "seductive" theme or sex as a trap or reward.

Indeed, though even if it's a reward, it's still probably a trap (http://blip.tv/the-spoony-experiment/counter-monkey-beware-women-for-they-come-from-hell-6507271)(warning: foul language, and no, I'm not sorry if this has already been posted in this thread).


I'm not denying that she's wearing a chain mail bikini. I'm just choosing not to focus on that fact.

And completely ignoring the LCD: "Hey, hot chick in a chainmail bikini. Sweet." :smalltongue:

[Worira]

Or, instead of trying to take it as commentary on real gender roles, you can take the nature of the beast as a given specific to that beast, and try to extrapolate and figure out how the species functions from there.



OK: It doesn't. Gynosphinxes only result from matings based on love and respect. Gynosphinxes don't respect Criosphinxes, and Androsphynxes are celibate (and also kinda jerks). Sphinxes would very rapidly become extinct if it weren't for their near-immortality.

[Roland St. Jude]

Sheriff: Please keep it on topic and civil.

[Frozen_Feet]

Yet another way to look at things:

The male sphinxes symbolize idealism, realism and cynicism, respectively. The female sphinx is the only one of them who is a real, whole person who can create something new. The existence of the female sphinx is trying to weigh pros and cons of the first two, while trying to avoid dangers of the third.

Pursuing an androsphinx means dedicating one's self to selfless practice to adhere to demanding morals, something that is likely to go entirely unrewarded, but has a tiny chance of creating something transcended and superior that can outlast the female.

Pursuing a criosphinx means partially giving up on such goals; doing what you can when you can't do what you want, settling for something less so life can continue, even if that life ends up losing some of its meaningfullness in the process.

It is the question: is it better to be good, than be happy? Is it right to settle for what's obtainable and forget of your dreams? Is it right to settle for what is, instead of what ought to be?

Meanwhile, Hieracosphinxes are the sins of the Gynosphinxes given form. They are their original sin, their mistakes and misery given a physical form that will return to haunt them and become even stronger every time the gynosphinxes fail to deal with them. Hieracosphinxes are the despair that lurks behind every corner, the skeleton in the closet, and a cruel reminder that the world might not just fall short of your ideals, it might be actively against them. Yet giving into this suffering will just mean perpetuating it...

Physical sex in this outlook is tangential. It is mostly symbolic; one should take it as neither adherence to or reinforcement of traditional gender roles. The sexes could fairly easily be swapped, without changing anything. Sphinxes are just physical manifestation of a deeper, more general conundrum of living beings.

Theme music! (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQCTzxmo3Kk)

[Froggie]

Or, instead of trying to take it as commentary on real gender roles, you can take the nature of the beast as a given specific to that beast, and try to extrapolate and figure out how the species functions from there.

I didn't take it as commentary. I said that I thought it drew heavily from the underlying structure in old fairytales which pretty much had men as either good or bad depending on their action and women as good or at worst neutral by default.
The maiden in the tower deserves to be rescued on virtue of being a maiden, not because she's proven herself good or sympathetic. That's pretty much what I was referring to.

Also, why don't the Gynosphinxes kill the little HieracoSphinxes at birth? It wouldn't help against possible bad apples amongst the Criosphinxes, but at least rooting out the purely evil ones when you can seems like the most logical path. Leaving it to fend for itself and grow up to be hateful and monstrous seems not only cruel, it's downright stupid.

[Ettin]

I guess to sum up sexism is completely subjective. If we choose to view something as sexist, then it is. If we choose to view something as not-sexist then it’s not sexist. So why don’t we all take off our sexism filter for a bit and enjoy gaming at the table; whether your character is wearing a chainmail bikini or full plate.

Because a "sexism filter" you can turn on and off like a faucet isn't a thing. This is just "cover your ears and go "LA LA LA"" reworded to make it seem enlightened and rational.

[obryn]

Because a "sexism filter" you can turn on and off like a faucet isn't a thing. This is just "cover your ears and go "LA LA LA"" reworded to make it seem enlightened and rational.
I wouldn't knock the "LA LA LA" method. That's the only way I've been able to keep my sanity through this cesspool of a thread.

[TheThan]

Because a "sexism filter" you can turn on and off like a faucet isn't a thing. This is just "cover your ears and go "LA LA LA"" reworded to make it seem enlightened and rational.

No I’m saying people are subjective by nature, we have the amazing power to “see” we they want to “see” and “read” anything we want into whatever we want. Much of the time sexism, racism or whatever “ism” is currently socially unacceptable is only there when you want it to be there. Now I’m not saying sexism doesn’t exist, it clearly does, or that we should ignore it when it happens.

I’m not an ostrich sticking my head in the dirt. I know sexism exists in the real world. I know there are people who bring it to the gaming table. I’m choosing to not allow sexism to happen at my gaming table by not reading it in the content of the games that i play.

I’ve gamed with girls before, I don’t “make it a thing”, and it doesn’t come up. If the player (male or female) wants to go get laid or somesuch; fine we have a fade to black moment and move on.

RPGs are a fantasy (regardless of what genre they’re in), we get to pretend to be someone else somewhere else without our set of problems. Why do we have to bring those same real world problems into our games?

[obryn]

RPGs are a fantasy (regardless of what genre they’re in), we get to pretend to be someone else somewhere else without our set of problems. Why do we have to bring those same real world problems into our games?
That's exactly what we're asking rpg designers. Why bring the problems of sexism, rape, and abuse into a fantasy where everyone is pretending to be someone else?

[Daer]

and once we have fantasy world where nothing bad ever happens to anyone and everyone is happy and wealthy and so on.. what then?

[Merellis]

No I’m saying people are subjective by nature, we have the amazing power to “see” we they want to “see” and “read” anything we want into whatever we want. Much of the time sexism, racism or whatever “ism” is currently socially unacceptable is only there when you want it to be there. Now I’m not saying sexism doesn’t exist, it clearly does, or that we should ignore it when it happens.

I’m not an ostrich sticking my head in the dirt. I know sexism exists in the real world. I know there are people who bring it to the gaming table. I’m choosing to not allow sexism to happen at my gaming table by not reading it in the content of the games that i play.

I’ve gamed with girls before, I don’t “make it a thing”, and it doesn’t come up. If the player (male or female) wants to go get laid or somesuch; fine we have a fade to black moment and move on.

RPGs are a fantasy (regardless of what genre they’re in), we get to pretend to be someone else somewhere else without our set of problems. Why do we have to bring those same real world problems into our games?

You're kind of contradicting yourself here by saying that it's only there when we want it to be there, and then saying you know that sexism exists. I'm also not sure how the situation of a character wanting sexual relations and then fading to black fits into your argument, it just seems kinda random to put that in.

As for your whole "close your eyes to the sexism" thing, it'll still be there whether you decide to see it or not. If I paint a thing blue and you close your eyes, it's still gonna be blue whether you look for the color or not.

Just as some things are going to have sexism, whether you're looking for it or not.

Onto the picture from before. It is actually sexist, that's not armor to say 'I'm a badass', that's armor asking you to look at her hips, bust, and waist... And then slide a sword into it because there's nothing there to stop it.

I mean, anyone fighting in that is pretty much gonna die because of how much easy access there is to the internal organs, the chest, and legs. Plus, that really doesn't look comfortable to wear, or even reliable to wear in a dark, damp, dank dungeon.

[Ettin]

That's exactly what we're asking rpg designers. Why bring the problems of sexism, rape, and abuse into a fantasy where everyone is pretending to be someone else?

Pretty much this. Roleplaying games don't happen in a vacuum - they're played by real people with real books written by other real people, most of whom inject ideas influenced by the real world into their games anyway. Declaring that "sexism is completely subjective" and your gaming table is a special place where you decide if it counts is like sticking your head in the sand and convincing yourself it's ice cream sprinkles.

[Leliel]

and once we have fantasy world where nothing bad ever happens to anyone and everyone is happy and wealthy and so on.. what then?

I dunno. What happens when you stop picking fights with strawmen? Or use complete non-sequiturs?

Sexism is One Problem. Orcs and Monsters are A Completely Different Problem. As is Poverty.

We can do with one less problem when we have thousands of others that don't make people really upset and uncomfortable OOC.

[Morithias]

Pretty much this. Roleplaying games don't happen in a vacuum - they're played by real people with real books written by other real people, most of whom inject ideas influenced by the real world into their games anyway. Declaring that "sexism is completely subjective" and your gaming table is a special place where you decide if it counts is like sticking your head in the sand and convincing yourself it's ice cream sprinkles.

I wouldn't call it completely subjective, but I do think that there is a LOT of things called 'sexist' that are exact opposites.

It's sexist for women to show off their bodies. It's sexist to tell them to cover up. It's sexist for a woman to be a housewife. It's sexist to decide you get to choose what kind of life the woman leads.

It's sexist to rescue a kidnapped girl. It's sexist to just leave her there to die.

There's so many things that are apparently sexist yet basically exact opposites I can't come to any conclusion other than sexism actually IS subjective.

[tasw]

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[Morithias]

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Whichever one wins the war. Because history is written by the winners.

[Merellis]

I wouldn't call it completely subjective, but I do think that there is a LOT of things called 'sexist' that are exact opposites.

It's sexist for women to show off their bodies. It's sexist to tell them to cover up. It's sexist for a woman to be a housewife. It's sexist to decide you get to choose what kind of life the woman leads.

It's sexist to rescue a kidnapped girl. It's sexist to just leave her there to die.

There's so many things that are apparently sexist yet basically exact opposites I can't come to any conclusion other than sexism actually IS subjective.

It's not sexist for a woman to choose to show off her body, it gets into the creepy territory if she's being forced, recorded without consent, or harassed for it. As for telling them to cover up, I always found it strange that women aren't allowed to go topless. Breasts aren't sex organs, they're literally things that produce nutrition for their young.. They don't really serve much else of a purpose beyond an erogenous zone, a zone that men share as well.

As for being a housewife, that's not sexist until it's being forced on them. Telling a woman what they're gonna do with their life is sexist though, and more than a little controlling.

As for rescuing a damsel in distress, the act of rescuing isn't sexist, it's the fact that most of the time it's the manly hero rescuing the defenseless woman from the evil. Gets worse when the woman has previously shown herself to be awesome, but is captured all the same so you can go rescue her!

... Not sure how deciding to not rescue her is sexist, unless you're arguing that you aren't going to rescue her because she's not a man. Either way, you're kind of being the jerk there by actively choosing not to do so.

@tasw:

Are you really saying that all Muslims are the same? Because that seems to be the road you're heading towards. :smallsigh:

[tasw]

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[Ettin]

words

Aw shucks, I was writing a reply but you worded it better. :smallredface:

[TheThan]

I wouldn't call it completely subjective, but I do think that there is a LOT of things called 'sexist' that are exact opposites.

It's sexist for women to show off their bodies. It's sexist to tell them to cover up. It's sexist for a woman to be a housewife. It's sexist to decide you get to choose what kind of life the woman leads.

It's sexist to rescue a kidnapped girl. It's sexist to just leave her there to die.

There's so many things that are apparently sexist yet basically exact opposites I can't come to any conclusion other than sexism actually IS subjective.

Exactly.
If we want to, we can see anything we want to as sexist. If we choose not to, then we can see most things as not being sexist. That’s the filter I was talking about.

If we sit down at a RPG table and start complaining about the sorceress’s slinky dress, or the short skirts the tavern wenches (or just the tavern wenches in general) are wearing, we’re probably in a mindset that allows us to easily see sexism where we probably shouldn't.

Someone may say a nude picture of a woman is sexist.
Someone else may say a picture of a woman a T-shirt and jeans is sexist.
Another may say a picture of Muslim woman in a Burqa is sexist.

See my point.
its all a matter of how we choose to view what we experience.

[Worira]

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[obryn]

Exactly.
If we want to, we can see anything we want to as sexist. If we choose not to, then we can see most things as not being sexist. That’s the filter I was talking about.

If we sit down at a RPG table and start complaining about the sorceress’s slinky dress, or the short skirts the tavern wenches (or just the tavern wenches in general) are wearing, we’re probably in a mindset that allows us to easily see sexism where we probably shouldn't.

Someone may say a nude picture of a woman is sexist.
Someone else may say a picture of a woman a T-shirt and jeans is sexist.
Another may say a picture of Muslim woman in a Burqa is sexist.

See my point.
its all a matter of how we choose to view what we experience.
I eagerly await the application of this "ignore it and it goes away" philosophy to the world's other social problems.

[Mr. Mask]

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[Worira]

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[Merellis]

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[tasw]

Whichever one wins the war. Because history is written by the winners.

And WAR is won by young soldiers. Not old people on social security.

[Mr. Mask]

Worira & Merelis: Ah. Missed that one.

[Morithias]

It's not sexist for a woman to choose to show off her body, it gets into the creepy territory if she's being forced, recorded without consent, or harassed for it. As for telling them to cover up, I always found it strange that women aren't allowed to go topless. Breasts aren't sex organs, they're literally things that produce nutrition for their young.. They don't really serve much else of a purpose beyond an erogenous zone, a zone that men share as well.

As for being a housewife, that's not sexist until it's being forced on them. Telling a woman what they're gonna do with their life is sexist though, and more than a little controlling.

As for rescuing a damsel in distress, the act of rescuing isn't sexist, it's the fact that most of the time it's the manly hero rescuing the defenseless woman from the evil. Gets worse when the woman has previously shown herself to be awesome, but is captured all the same so you can go rescue her!

... Not sure how deciding to not rescue her is sexist, unless you're arguing that you aren't going to rescue her because she's not a man. Either way, you're kind of being the jerk there by actively choosing not to do so.

@tasw:

Are you really saying that all Muslims are the same? Because that seems to be the road you're heading towards. :smallsigh:

1. Not sexist to show off their body willingly. Explain the backlash against the Booth Babes at E3, or backlash against porn in general.

2. Telling a woman what to do with her life is sexist. Yet if a woman choose to be a housewife, endless feminists will go "SHE IS OPPRESSED SHE NEEDS TO DO SOMETHING ELSE WITH HER LIFE." Because no true women ever decides she doesn't want the stuff that comes with a workplace environment.

3. As for the "hero rescuing the helpless girl from evil." Try this.

Google a story called "The pilfered princess." and send it to a collection of people you consider 'feminists'. I promise you that even though the story ends on what I personally consider an epic note for the princess, it would probably still end up called sexist by a lot of them.

The story ends with the princess killing the dark overlord AND the knight that came to rescue her and becoming the new evil overlord.

[tasw]

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[navar100]

Men tend to be visual focused. Women tend to be audio focused. Female characters are in chain bikinis because men like to see that. Women aren't as muck liking bare-chested muscle men because women aren't so visual. The bare muscled chest is attractive to gay men, but that's a side effect. As mentioned the muscles are a sign of strength and power to which men aspire.

Since women are audio they're focused on words. Men look at porn because they're visual. Women have their own porn but call it romance novels. All female strippers have to do is show their breasts and wiggle and men are turned on. Male strippers need to wear costumes and put on a dance to tell a story. Men want their girlfriends to use make-up and wear pretty clothes. Women want their boyfriends to talk about each other's day. Men complain women talk too much and nag. Women complain men see them as sex objects. Because of feminism, men are evil sexist pigs for being visual is the judgement of the land and must be stamped out.

It gets to the point where sometimes I really don't think women love men as much as men love women.

[tasw]

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[AMFV]

1. Not sexist to show off their body willingly. Explain the backlash against the Booth Babes at E3, or backlash against porn in general.

2. Telling a woman what to do with her life is sexist. Yet if a woman choose to be a housewife, endless feminists will go "SHE IS OPPRESSED SHE NEEDS TO DO SOMETHING ELSE WITH HER LIFE." Because no true women ever decides she doesn't want the stuff that comes with a workplace environment.

3. As for the "hero rescuing the helpless girl from evil." Try this.

Google a story called "The pilfered princess." and send it to a collection of people you consider 'feminists'. I promise you that even though the story ends on what I personally consider an epic note for the princess, it would probably still end up called sexist by a lot of them.

The story ends with the princess killing the dark overlord AND the knight that came to rescue her and becoming the new evil overlord.

I absolutely agree that the first topic is fairly controversial, I'm not sure if pornography is really a sexist thing. Certainly that could be interesting to debate, feminists for the most part have had huge schisms regarding sexual issues, so it is probable that "clothing is good" vs. "clothing is bad" arguments may be resulting from internal schisming inside the feminist groups.

I have seen a lot of issues with the housewife thing, that was a choice my mother made, and I hardly she was oppressed or forced into it. In fact she very much prefers that to when she's been working in the past. I agree fully on this point as I've met many women who find that idea kind of appalling.

The real reason I wanted to comment is firstly because I agreed with everything, but lastly because that story sounds truly awesome and I feel the need to thank you for having shared at least the idea of it with me.

[Morithias]

And your point is what?

Both men AND women are sexist against women and only trans people are fair?



No my point with that post, was that just getting more women in the industry isn't going to 'magically' start generating non-sexist pieces of work. Why? As I stated in another post, what gets made is what SELLS.

It doesn't matter if you have a whole team of women working on a game, if the executive has veto power, or there are treads showing 'mature' games are selling better, that's what is going to get made.

You want to get less sexist games being made? Start buying stuff that fits the views you want.

I for example, want more simulation games so I bought unholy heights, Evil Genius, Tropico 4, and Patrician IV.

I don't want first person shooters. So I didn't buy call of duty ghosts.

We are consumer, and currency is our megaphone. Speaking with your wallets will cause more change than any amount of protest in the streets.



The real reason I wanted to comment is firstly because I agreed with everything, but lastly because that story sounds truly awesome and I feel the need to thank you for having shared at least the idea of it with me.

The best part about the story is that the princess doesn't come across like a mary-sue. But more of a trickster who using logical things like knocking over lamps and such manages to out play everyone. It was like the tales of old, where a smart youth out plays the most combat powerful enemies with smarts rather than brawn.

[Vamphyr]

I absolutely agree that the first topic is fairly controversial, I'm not sure if pornography is really a sexist thing.

The reason a lot of people have an issue with the porn industry is that it's controlled by men. Some women have a very positive experience and become famous, but there is a good portion that work under less than positive conditions. There are several documentaries that discuss drug abuse, sexual assualt, and STI's during porn filmings for no-name actresses.

Also, the industry is focused on the male consumer, which increasingly craves more and more violent sexual content featuring young models.

Like the porn industry had child porn laws changed so they could feature women who looked like children

Porn also strips women down to nothing more than sex objects, which after prolonged viewing (starting as young as 11 for some boys) can cause difficulties creating and maintaining intimate relationships with actual women.

All in all; porn can be sexist because it boils women down to sex objects and lots of producers will get girls tweaked on coke and do stuff that they may not consent to, and then edit the film to remove the parts where she says "no."

[Serpentine]

It's sexist for women to show off their bodies.It's sexist that women are pressured by society to be sexualised, and that so much fantasy art and depictions of women in general emphasise their bodies, etc. A woman choosing to show off her body is not in itself "sexist"; the context that leads to that decision may be.
The problem with porn and the E3 "babes" is not that these women are choosing to expose their bodies. In fact, there is a not-insignificant submovement in feminism that is porn-positive. The problem is when porn and those "babes" is men exploiting women. Porn and those things can be non-exploitative, and I believe are increasingly becoming so. Historically, though, they have been very much exploitative.
My perspective as a feminist: Women - and men - are welcome to show as much skin as they do or do not want to. I have no problem with women doing porn, as long as they are doing it of their own free will, with their own agency, and are doing the sort of porn they want to be. I have no strong feelings on the subject of pornography itself, and I believe many other people have said a lot more on the subject than I ever could.

It's sexist to tell them to cover up.Yes. To TELL THEM to cover up. Women - and men - should wear however much clothing they are comfortable with, by their own standards. Other people deciding that for them, especially on the basis of their sex, is what is sexist.
My perspective as a feminist: I have no problem with people wearing whatever their beliefs and comfort levels makes them want to. I believe that banning such items is exactly as bad as making them compulsory. The problem is when this is enforced by others, especially - but not only - under threat of violence or the law. I also think that the "well she had it coming, dressed so scantily..." is completely ridiculous, and most of all insulting for men: it says that men are such mindless beasts, that seeing just a little bit of skin - or even a lot of it - is enough to drive them into such a frenzy that they are incapable of being responsible for their own actions. THAT is sexist, and I don't believe it is at all true.

It's sexist for a woman to be a housewife.It is sexist for a woman to feel pressured to work in the home, and many women do still feel so pressured. It is also, incidentally, sexist for a man to be made to feel like less of a man just because he chooses to be a househusband.
Women who choose to be housewives being dismissed as "anti-feminist" or whatever has been a problem, but it is also one I believe is changing - certainly it is a lot less common than people such as yourself make out.
My perspective as a feminist: Men and women should both be free to choose to be primary caregivers if they so desire. They should also be given the social and financial support to make it actually possible. The key point, there, though, is the choice. Freedom to choose means nothing if there is no alternative option.

It's sexist to decide you get to choose what kind of life the woman leads.Yes, it is. Men and women should be free to make their own decisions, based on their own preferences and abilities.

It's sexist to rescue a kidnapped girl. It's sexist to just leave her there to die.No. It is sexist for girls to always be the ones who get kidnapped and need to be rescued. It is sexist for the overwhelming majority of heroes to be male, and victims to be female. It is sexist for female characters to hardly ever have their own agency, their own competency, their own ability to rescue themselves. Incidentally, I find the fact that you considered the opposite of "rescue a kidnapped girl" to be "leaving her there to die" quite telling - having the girl rescue herself, or having a male get kidnapped was never a option?
My perspective as a feminist: One single story that involves a girl getting kidnapped and needing rescuing is not a problem, and not necessarily sexist. The fact that almost every single story of that kind that has ever been written has the girl getting rescued and needing to be rescued is the problem, and is sexist. That is what needs to be changed. All the individual stories that follow this pattern might not be problems in themselves, but every one contributes to the overall issue and is therefore a legitimate object for criticism.

There's so many things that are apparently sexist yet basically exact opposites I can't come to any conclusion other than sexism actually IS subjective.Here's an easy rule of thumb for you, then: if you find yourself treating, depicting or interacting with someone in a particular way because of the sex they happen to be, then you are probably doing something sexist. If you observe an institution that treats, depicts or interacts with people differently depending upon their sex, it is probably sexist. If you observe a pattern of people being treated, depicted or interacted with in specific consistent ways depending on their sex, that pattern probably indicates a sexist thought system, regardless of individual instances. If you read a story in which the sex of characters is a primary defining characteristic - particularly in which "female" is the defining characteristic - it is probably sexist.
If sex is the benchmark by which decisions are made on how to treat someone, sexism is involved.
It's not rocket surgery.


Libertad: Very nice, good work :smile: Sorry I don't have the time (nor the patience :smallsigh:) to go through this whole thread).

[Morithias]

"The Paper Bag Princess".

Read it. It does basically exactly what you want. A story where the girl rescues the guy.

Then there's the pilfered princess where the princess rescues herself, via that epic ending.

Of course if you want a bigger budget version, there's King's bounty Armored Princess, where you play a princess with a pet dragon, who rampages across a world, to save her kingdom from an archdemon, rescuing a fair number of males along the way.

...seriously go play that game it's bloody awesome.

[tasw]

{{scrubbed}}

[Morithias]

{{scrubbed}}
You clearly need to watch more extra credits. Making a videogame is WAY more complex than you make it out to be. You have to deal with publishers, you have to create demos, and it's an extremely expensive process.

Extra Credits stated that out of a $60 game, around $27 reaches the publisher, and AAA games average around 30 million in costs. That means they have to sell 1.1 BRAND NEW copies just to break even.

So they don't take a lot of risks.

How do you encourage them to take those risks?

Buying indie games that do such things, then eventually a publisher will go "hey these games with strong female leads are selling really well, let's green light a AAA one."

And then if all goes well, which isn't guaranteed because making a AAA game is extremely complex, it'll turn out good and people will buy it.

I fail to see how me saying "publishers make what they think they can make money with" is me saying I need to be in charge.

[Axinian]

Y'know, I was thinking about typing up a rant about my thoughts, since what I've seen in this thread has been weighing heavily on my mind. But Serpentine pretty much said everything I wanted to say, so thank you for that Serp!

Also

It's not rocket surgery.
Sounds pretty hardcore!

[Worira]

The worst part is the g-forces chucking your surgical instruments around.

[Vamphyr]

{{scrubbed}}

You keep referring to trans people as if they're some hermaphroditic third party, which is pretty offensive.

[Gnomish Wanderer]

I just wanted to post support for Serpentine's epic and accurate post there. It's everything I could hope to say.

And Morithias, examples of stories that do it right do not make the majority okay.

[Ettin]

1. Not sexist to show off their body willingly. Explain the backlash against the Booth Babes at E3, or backlash against porn in general.

2. Telling a woman what to do with her life is sexist. Yet if a woman choose to be a housewife, endless feminists will go "SHE IS OPPRESSED SHE NEEDS TO DO SOMETHING ELSE WITH HER LIFE." Because no true women ever decides she doesn't want the stuff that comes with a workplace environment.

3. As for the "hero rescuing the helpless girl from evil." Try this.

Google a story called "The pilfered princess." and send it to a collection of people you consider 'feminists'. I promise you that even though the story ends on what I personally consider an epic note for the princess, it would probably still end up called sexist by a lot of them.

As for 1., the problem with booth babes and such is the gaming industry exploits women as sex objects to pander to men far too often, in places it shouldn't, and it makes a hell of a lot of people uncomfortable (as it should). It is totally possible to recognise that and still be okay with women dressing how they want. It's not a "women can never show off!" thing.

2. and 3. kind of sidestep the point to set up vague strawmen, so I don't really have an opinion on them. "If you send this one story I summarised part of to a bunch of feminists, they'd call it sexist probably!" wouldn't really make the whole "damsel in distress" thing not sexist, even if it were true.

E: Also Serpentine's post is great.

[tasw]

{{scrubbed}}

[Serpentine]

"The Paper Bag Princess".

Read it. It does basically exactly what you want. A story where the girl rescues the guy.

Then there's the pilfered princess where the princess rescues herself, via that epic ending.

Of course if you want a bigger budget version, there's King's bounty Armored Princess, where you play a princess with a pet dragon, who rampages across a world, to save her kingdom from an archdemon, rescuing a fair number of males along the way.

...seriously go play that game it's bloody awesome.Already covered that, thanks.

No. It is sexist for girls to always be the ones who get kidnapped and need to be rescued. It is sexist for the overwhelming majority of heroes to be male, and victims to be female. It is sexist for female characters to hardly ever have their own agency, their own competency, their own ability to rescue themselves. Incidentally, I find the fact that you considered the opposite of "rescue a kidnapped girl" to be "leaving her there to die" quite telling - having the girl rescue herself, or having a male get kidnapped was never a option?
My perspective as a feminist: One single story that involves a girl getting kidnapped and needing rescuing is not a problem, and not necessarily sexist. The fact that almost every single story of that kind that has ever been written has the girl getting rescued and needing to be rescued is the problem, and is sexist. That is what needs to be changed. All the individual stories that follow this pattern might not be problems in themselves, but every one contributes to the overall issue and is therefore a legitimate object for criticism.
...
If you observe a pattern of people being treated, depicted or interacted with in specific consistent ways depending on their sex, that pattern probably indicates a sexist thought system, regardless of individual instances. If you read a story in which the sex of characters is a primary defining characteristic - particularly in which "female" is the defining characteristic - it is probably sexist.
I do like to hear about stories that break the mould, so thanks a lot for listing those. Genuinely. I'll try to remember to check them out.
The fact that more and more such stories are being written all the time is great - and is a testimony to the good that feminism can do. The fact that society is getting better doesn't mean it was never bad, nor that it doesn't need more work. We should point out and praise the progress that is made, but not at the expense of continuing to put pressure on the areas that lag behind.
Yes, there are good stories, from this perspective, that exist. Yes, there are more of them than there used to be. But you could list a thousand exceptions, and they would still be the exceptions. Until they are no longer exceptional, but just another kind of story, these industries still suffer from sexism.


Y'know, I was thinking about typing up a rant about my thoughts, since what I've seen in this thread has been weighing heavily on my mind. But Serpentine pretty much said everything I wanted to say, so thank you for that Serp!

Also

Sounds pretty hardcore!

I just wanted to post support for Serpentine's epic and accurate post there. It's everything I could hope to say.
http://23rdworld.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/tinyfeyfive.gif

[tasw]

{{scrubbed}}

[Mr. Mask]

You clearly need to watch more extra credits. I think we all need to watch more Extra Credits.

[Morithias]

I posted this in the other thread too but I have a thought experiment.

Let's say there was a society that evolved with the opposite gender roles we have.

One of their primary stories is about a prince that gets kidnapped and the female knight has to rescue him.

Is this story sexist?

[Serpentine]

I just had a thought.

Let's say in theory there existed a society where the gender roles evolved in the opposite direction to our own.

One of their "classic" stories, is the kidnapped prince that the female knight must rescue.

Is this story sexist?

If yes.

Then why do we praise that exact story written in our society as "it done right" or "a step in the right direction."If almost every story involves a kidnapped prince being rescued by the lady knight, and this is in the context of a historically strongly female-dominated society, then it is a sexist pattern of stories.
In our society, we "praise" that story because it is exceptional. In our world, almost every story of this type involves a kidnapped princess being rescued by the masculine knight. This is in the context of a historically strongly male-dominated society, in which men are disproportionately given representation, agency, and the ability to make their own decisions. The man-rescues-woman story reflects this context, is the standard, and in combination with those factors is sexist. The woman-rescues-man story defies the standard, is exceptional, and is therefore praiseworthy (at least for that aspect).

In your hypothetical society, almost every story of this type will involve a kidnapped prince being rescued by the feminine knight. It would be in the context of a historically strongly female-dominated society, in which women are disproportionately given representation, agency, and the ability to make their own decisions. The woman-rescues-man story would reflect that context, would be the standard, and in combination with those factors would be sexist. The man-rescues-woman story would defy the standard, would be exceptional, and would therefore be praiseworthy (at least for that aspect).

You keep trying to find double standards. There are none here.


I'm saying, both of them being sexist....means that sexism is not always constant and can change and evolve like other aspects of society.

Who knows what will be considered sexist in 50 years. We've reached the point where we're evolving on a technological and cultural level faster than a biological one.
It means that sexism is contextual. No one has ever said otherwise. It's pretty much a self-evident fact right there.
I'm really not sure what point you're trying to make. "If the circumstances of the sexes were reversed, sexism would be reversed too"? Well, yeah. And?

[tasw]

{{scrubbed}}

[Morithias]

{{scrubbed}}

What better reason is there?

How the hell do you kidnap someone who is powerful enough to fight you off?

Hell that's just another "sexist" trope.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Chickification

[IronFist]

Men tend to be visual focused. Women tend to be audio focused. Female characters are in chain bikinis because men like to see that. Women aren't as muck liking bare-chested muscle men because women aren't so visual. The bare muscled chest is attractive to gay men, but that's a side effect. As mentioned the muscles are a sign of strength and power to which men aspire.

Since women are audio they're focused on words. Men look at porn because they're visual. Women have their own porn but call it romance novels. All female strippers have to do is show their breasts and wiggle and men are turned on. Male strippers need to wear costumes and put on a dance to tell a story. Men want their girlfriends to use make-up and wear pretty clothes. Women want their boyfriends to talk about each other's day. Men complain women talk too much and nag. Women complain men see them as sex objects. Because of feminism, men are evil sexist pigs for being visual is the judgement of the land and must be stamped out.

It gets to the point where sometimes I really don't think women love men as much as men love women.
According to your description, I'm a woman.



How the hell do you kidnap someone who is powerful enough to fight you off?

With trickery? Poison? Overwhelming them with numbers? That's how Superman, Batman, Hulk and Spider-Man get kidnapped every few months.

[Morithias]

According to your description, I'm a woman.


With trickery? Poison? Overwhelming them with numbers? That's how Superman, Batman, Hulk and Spider-Man get kidnapped every few months.

Hmmm...

Okay. So it's not the kidnapping and rescue itself that's sexist.

It's more the fact that there's never any real thought put into the kidnapping.

Basically it's sexist because it's lazy writing.

....which actually makes a lot of sense.

Alright. Makes sense. hmmm...alright...I think I have an idea...

Edit: Idea is for a skype campaign, not for another debate. Sorry, got kind of thinking out loud and my hands got ahead of me.

[Ettin]

According to your description, I'm a woman.

Welp, turns out you don't have visual porn. Better invest in reading glasses!

[IronFist]

Hmmm...

Okay. So it's not the kidnapping and rescue itself that's sexist.

It's more the fact that there's never any real thought put into the kidnapping.

Basically it's sexist because it's lazy writing.

....which actually makes a lot of sense.

Alright. Makes sense. hmmm...alright...I think I have an idea...

It's neither here nor there. A given female character not being a badass warrior does not make a story sexist. Some characters (and by extension, some female characters) are not good in combat. You can't reduce the issue to a simple "yes/no" in a single scenario.
The damsel in distress trope has a lot of baggage behind it and it is sexist because of all those portrayals of women as "someone to be saved". It means those characters only have any value in the story because of other, male characters.
Having a non-combatant female be captured is not sexist. Have a female character in your story for the sole purpose of her being rescued by a male character is sexist.

[Serpentine]

Hmmm...

Okay. So it's not the kidnapping and rescue itself that's sexist.

It's more the fact that there's never any real thought put into the kidnapping.

Basically it's sexist because it's lazy writing.

....which actually makes a lot of sense.

Alright. Makes sense. hmmm...alright...I think I have an idea...

Edit: Idea is for a skype campaign, not for another debate. Sorry, got kind of thinking out loud and my hands got ahead of me.
It's sexist because, in our society, it is almost always happening to women. Women are the objects, the victims, the goals, the thing-to-be-acquired, the reward-for-a-job-well-done. In extreme cases - yes, often of bad writing - you could easily replace the damsel with a rock and not change anything much about the story.
In contrast, in these stories, it is almost always the men who are the protagonists, the heroes, the ones who get to make decisions and go out and do things and have meaningful interactions with their environment.
To reiterate: no, individual stories that follow this pattern are not necessarily, in and of themselves, bad. And yes, there are stories that follow different patterns (c.f. Tamora Pierce <3). But the overwhelming majority, even now, do follow this pattern, and that is what is sexist. Men are protagonists, women are victims, and any story where this is not true is exceptional. That is the problem.

[Morithias]

It's neither here nor there. A given female character not being a badass warrior does not make a story sexist. Some characters (and by extension, some female characters) are not good in combat. You can't reduce the issue to a simple "yes/no" in a single scenario.
The damsel in distress trope has a lot of baggage behind it and it is sexist because of all those portrayals of women as "someone to be saved". It means those characters only have any value in the story because of other, male characters.
Having a non-combatant female be captured is not sexist. Have a female character in your story for the sole purpose of her being rescued by a male character is sexist.

Like I said Lazy writing.

The way to avoid sexism is to foreshadow, justify, and plan the story beyond the basics. To play with the tropes and innovate. To make the world truly alive and not excuse plots, and cookie cutter characters.

It's probably the same reason why I have less problem with Peach being kidnapped in the paper mario games, than the normal mario games. In the Paper Mario games she's actually given a character and does some pretty cool stuff to help out. Hell in the 3rd game she actually fights along side you.

In the normal games...she might as well not even exist. Mario might as well be chasing after a briefcase full of money.


It's sexist because, in our society, it is almost always happening to women.

And hopefully that will change with time...at least I hope it will. Personally I'm still looking for another "My World My Way". That game was very meta, and the ending was hilarious.

Of course the princess maker games are pretty cool too. How many games let you raise a 10 year old girl to the point where she can beat up the god of war?

Edit: No that last sentence isn't a joke, you can actually do that in Princess Maker 2.

Edit: Huh. I'm starting to think it's because I actively seek out niche games and stories with such plots that I might think this is a less big problem than it is....

[GolemsVoice]

I think a lot of people have false preconceptions of feminism because it is a very broad field, as far as I understand it, and over the years, different people have sometimes said redically different things, so if you want to hold a very specific opinion of feminism, it's likely that SOMEBODY once said something that proves your point.

The important thing is to remember that this might neither be the current general opinion, nor might it ever have been general opinion.

[Poison_Fish]

The majority of porn producers and directors are actually female. Turns out it was easier to appeal to males then females and they wanted both sexes money so they hired women for most of those positions because they would have a better idea of how to make women pay for porn. Making men pay for it was very, very easy.

No (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:American_pornographic_film_directors). Quick content check on my part of identified men is roughly 131. for women 65, with 4 unknowns.


In porn women at this point are most often in control, not sex objects and men watching a lot of porn are more likely to be shy and hoping the woman will take charge then the opposite.

Not supported by most evidence. Have a ted talk (http://blog.ted.com/2009/12/02/cindy_gallop_ma/). Also don't bother with Zimbardo. He has glaring validity and bias issues in his research and is still riding off his coattails of the standford prison experiment, which also suffers from numerous problems as an experiment.


The sex industry regularly tests for drugs and STDs and your statements on that are pure ignorance. No one has been on coke in porn (or anywhere else unless they are very rich) for 20 years for example. Meth and heroin replaced it and anyone who tests positive wont be able to work for 90 days in most states.

no (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1892037/) and no (http://www.porn-report.com/drug-use.htm). Yes, some of it is dated. But based on additional accounts over the past years, much of the behavior has not changed. Yes, accounts aren't entirely valid. But are more valid then someone making something up.


{{scrubbed}}

"Based on my anecdotal experience with "friends" on how they can't pass. Therefore they don't get to be how they have identified"

{{scrubbed}}


this (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=16252081&postcount=293)

A salute
http://i358.photobucket.com/albums/oo27/STC_24/Intrest/StarTrekTheNextGenerationCaptain-5.jpg

[AMFV]

I think a lot of people have false preconceptions of feminism because it is a very broad field, as far as I understand it, and over the years, different people have sometimes said redically different things, so if you want to hold a very specific opinion of feminism, it's likely that SOMEBODY once said something that proves your point.

The important thing is to remember that this might neither be the current general opinion, nor might it ever have been general opinion.

Actually Feminism is a political movement not a field. A scientific field cannot exist with specific mandated goals because that's counter to performing unbiased research. Women's Studies is a field of study, and one I've not seen great things from, but it is a legitimate field of study.

There isn't really a strong solidarity in the feminist movement at this time either, there are feminists who believe that working towards gender neutrality is the way to go (biologically its impossible in my opinion), there are feminists who believe that they should embrace and support the aspects of femininity that they approve of (a better goal, at least to my thinking). But they all have stated goals which makes it again, not a field, not research, not science.

[Themrys]

There isn't really a strong solidarity in the feminist movement at this time either, there are feminists who believe that working towards gender neutrality is the way to go (biologically its impossible in my opinion), there are feminists who believe that they should embrace and support the aspects of femininity that they approve of (a better goal, at least to my thinking). But they all have stated goals which makes it again, not a field, not research, not science.

No, gender neutrality is possible. You're confusing that with sex neutrality, which is only possible for very few people, who were born that way and most of them are probably not happy about that.

There are feminists who believe that men are naturally more aggressive than women, etc, but even if that should be true in general (it's certainly not true for individuals), it is best ignored. Unless you think men should be controlled more rigidly, subjected to psychological screening so that their inborn aggression doesn't cause harm, and such. Do you really want that?
(I know, I know, usually stereotypes are just used to tell women to stay at home and have babies, but if you would take them to their logical conclusion without privileging men ... this is what could happen)

Forcing people into gender stereotypes only causes harm to those whom the shoe doesn't fit, and those whom it does fit, do not profit from it enough to justify it.

Men in general do profit from gender roles being assigned to both sexes, but that's not the same thing.

[TheFallenOne]

Short version (and out of mod voice): Marxism is an explicitly political and economic policy. While it might be applicable to specific games, it's generally best to avoid it. Sexism, however, is an endemic feature of gaming culture as a whole, and so can be appropriate for discussion if done respectfully. However, as Lewis's law points out, chance are, once you post something on sexism or feminism, you're going to get a wave of **** directed at you. Rape threats. Death threats. "This isn't important, why are we talking about this!" "You're trying to change us! If you don't like it go away!"

The inversion of sexism isn't feminism. It's equality. Feminism is a diverse movement, it sadly includes many who are hypocritical, insulting and sexist themselves(towards men and sometimes even other women who don't conform to their ideology). These specimens also tend to be loud and thus noticable. With that in mind backlash against feminism(or what calls itself/is called feminism) is often justified. In many other cases of course it is not, when the objection stems from a sexist attitude or includes things like threats of rape and violence.
So it is very disconcerting that you endorse the whole of feminism in red moderator voice. Why not instead endorse equality and tolerance and condemn sexism? That we should all be able to get behind. Well, there are still people who won't sadly, but at least it gives a good baseline what environment we want here without endorsing something divisive, varied and in some of its forms flat-out wrong.


I think one of the best antidotes to it is to create more work that is not sexist, and to call out sexism. That's already part of the rules here; slurs based on sex and gender identity get classified as hate speech; "You're a stupid jerk" gets a year-long flaming warning or infraction; "You're gay (and therefore bad)" can get you a permanent Hate Speech note on your account.

Does "You're a racist/sexist" get you a year-long flaming warning or infraction too?


Iconic barbarian, who presents female?
http://www.paperspencils.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/Amiri.jpg

This little number says "I enjoy long walks on the beach and being eviscerated." I see that and all I can think is:

http://tamrielfoundry.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Skimpy-Armor-Regret-Decision.jpg

First things first: I wholeheartedly agree with your overall point. The frequent and impractical lack of clothing/armor on female fantasy characters is concerning. BUT, there can be wrong arguments in favour of true statements. The barbarian image you cite here is one such example.

Look at Conan. Look at the cover of Masters of the Wild where the iconic 3.X barbarian amazingly exposes chest and legs in subzero temperatures. Look at the Diablo II barbarian who shows much more skin (http://majorslack.com/pics/screenshots/diablo_01.jpg) than any of the other classes, three of them female. Or maybe just put 'barbarian' in the google image search and see how many depictions have exposed chests. It is easily the majority.

So, this barbarian doesn't wear little armor because she is female. This barbarian wears little armor because she is a barbarian.

[AMFV]

No, gender neutrality is possible. You're confusing that with sex neutrality, which is only possible for very few people, who were born that way and most of them are probably not happy about that.

There are feminists who believe that men are naturally more aggressive than women, etc, but even if that should be true in general (it's certainly not true for individuals), it is best ignored. Unless you think men should be controlled more rigidly, subjected to psychological screening so that their inborn aggression doesn't cause harm, and such. Do you really want that?
(I know, I know, usually stereotypes are just used to tell women to stay at home and have babies, but if you would take them to their logical conclusion without privileging men ... this is what could happen)

Forcing people into gender stereotypes only causes harm to those whom the shoe doesn't fit, and those whom it does fit, do not profit from it enough to justify it.

Men in general do profit from gender roles being assigned to both sexes, but that's not the same thing.

There are certainly biological differences, and hormonal differences between men and women. Frankly men do tend to be more aggressive, because that's a proven side effect of Testosterone, which men possess. I don't think men or women should be treated differently, but I think that some stereotypes may have root in biology, however poorly defined.

[Black Jester]

{{scrubbed}}

Meep. Wrong. But way to go to create an urban myth. While there are a few female porn producers, the overall majority of the
The one difference is that porn actresses are usually higher paid than their male counterparts (in an interesting twist of the usual relationship in payment when it comes to gender), the vast majority of actual producers and directors and distributors are, indeed male and to a extremely high degree o at least 90%. The one role women had in the porn industry behind the scenes have mostly been replaced with certain drugs you get offered a lot by spambots. There are a few women who make a lot of money in porn, but they are almost all actrices or former actresses and it is the huuuge exception. Porn producers are an almost exclusively male club.
There is also not a large market for porn targeted at women. Even though pornography has become a lot more mainstream in the last decade or two, it is usually understand that the main target group are straight males. there are various niches for other groups, but the only one that is actually more than a tiny fringe scene is gay porn (which also focuses on men as a target group).
And besides, in this day and age, who pays for porn anyway?

{{scrubbed}}

[Frozen_Feet]

That's exactly what we're asking rpg designers. Why bring the problems of sexism, rape, and abuse into a fantasy where everyone is pretending to be someone else?

Because tragedy and gallows humour are legitimate genres. If you don't want to see them, vote with your legs and money and don't buy games that advertize themselves as "dark" and "gritty".

A lot of the resurging of (allegedly) misogynistic attitudes in gaming is due to the pervasive attitute that to be serious, you need to controversial, repgugnant, amoral or immoral etc. This is even reflected in color schemes of many games, especially 1st person shooters, that tend to be brown, grey and muted. And unfortunately, that sells. See: GTA. See GTA especially.

Few guys on the internet complaining about "sexism!" is not going to do anything about this, because sexism isn't the cause, it's a symptom. It is also free advertizement for the people who makes this kind of stuff. If one producer can make lots of money with it, hundreds of other producers will try to ride their coasttail by mimicking them.


Actually Feminism is a political movement not a field. A scientific field cannot exist with specific mandated goals because that's counter to performing unbiased research. Women's Studies is a field of study, and one I've not seen great things from, but it is a legitimate field of study.

I'm going to tell you a joke. It's a sexist joke, so sue me. :smalltongue:

*Ahem* Here goes: women's studies is a field for angry young women who don't have what it takes to do real studies.

More seriously, I do percieve the existence and prevalence of sociology and women studies in female academics to be concerning. Why? Because around these parts, they don't give a real future to many of the girls who go and study them. And they are girls, overwhelmingly so. But what is the actual result? They become freelance journalists or elementary school teachers at best. At worst, they are forced to switch fields, and end up doing a job they could've entered with three years less of education, and we get to read once more how women in workplaces are "more educated than men".

It is fairly ironic for feminists to complain of the wage gap, when it would do far more to close that gap for women studies to be banned and for girls who take it educate themselves to be plumber, construction workers or electricians.

[GolemsVoice]

Actually Feminism is a political movement not a field. A scientific field cannot exist with specific mandated goals because that's counter to performing unbiased research. Women's Studies is a field of study, and one I've not seen great things from, but it is a legitimate field of study.

There isn't really a strong solidarity in the feminist movement at this time either, there are feminists who believe that working towards gender neutrality is the way to go (biologically its impossible in my opinion), there are feminists who believe that they should embrace and support the aspects of femininity that they approve of (a better goal, at least to my thinking). But they all have stated goals which makes it again, not a field, not research, not science.

Maybe field was the wrong word. I was thinking of "the vast amount of opinions held by individuals and groups calling themselves feminist". I chose field because it also evoke a sense of distance within itself. And what you're saying is exactly what I wanted to say. There is no single one feminism, and likely there never will be.

[Themrys]

Because tragedy and gallows humour are legitimate genres. If you don't want to see them, vote with your legs and money and don't buy games that advertize themselves as "dark" and "gritty".


"gallows humour" can only be made by done who are about to be hanged, not by those who ordered the execution. You need to be aware of this.

The only man that I have ever seen joking about sexism in an actually funny way was fantasy author Jim C. Hines.
http://www.jimchines.com/2013/10/fake-writer-girls/
He's literally the only one, and he's constantly writing against sexism and racism and other -isms in his blog.

Most men, when joking about sexism, are actually supporting it under the cover of humour.

And I don't see why you have to torture women for "tragedy". You can have just as much tragedy with torturing men. Really, I prefer authors like Tolkien, who, all in all, just do not mention women, to those who mention women only to have them raped for "Tragedy!"

@AMVF: If you don't think women and men should be treated differently, why do you talk about those "differences" at all? If they're true, then they don't need your protection, and you're only derailing the discussion about things that can be changed and need to be changed for no reason at all.

[Froggie]

And I don't see why you have to torture women for "tragedy". You can have just as much tragedy with torturing men.


Not if you've been taught that men don't deserve your sympathy. If only women are given sympathy and thus it's only seen as tragic or horrifying when women are tortured, then only women will be tortured for "tragic effect".

Fact is that men are seen as more deserving of physical and mental violence in media and real life. The effect of this is that when a writer wants to portray torture as horrifying and wrong women will be the victims because having a man be the victim would not give the right audience response.

It's related to how much violence you can show men and women being subjected to. The tolerance for showing violence perpetrated at men is higher so men will be shown brutalized more often and in more extreme ways, whereas with women the violence will be off camera or heavily implied instead.

An example of this is Star Wars, where Leia is implied to be tortured in "A New Hope", while in "The Empire Strikes Back", Han is shown to be tortured on screen, complementary horrific screams included.

[Themrys]

Not if you've been taught that men don't deserve your sympathy. If only women are given sympathy and thus it's only seen as tragic or horrifying when women are tortured, then only women will be tortured for "tragic effect".


So, you are saying that tragedy is not possible without sexism, because of sexism, and because of that, women should not complain about sexism, so that the poor sexist men can have their tragedies, which they need so desperately?

What?

If you can't write a tragedy without sexism against women, because violence against men doesn't make you feel anything (because you're sexist), then the solution is not to write sexism against women. The solution is to get rid of your internalized sexism.
Or, possibly, write a tragical story about your lack of compassion towards men. If THAT isn't sad and dark and gritty, I don't know what is.

[Terraoblivion]

So, you are saying that tragedy is not possible without sexism, because of sexism, and because of that, women should not complain about sexism, so that the poor sexist men can have their tragedies, which they need so desperately?

What?

If you can't write a tragedy without sexism against women, because violence against men doesn't make you feel anything (because you're sexist), then the solution is not to write sexism against women. The solution is to get rid of your internalized sexism.
Or, possibly, write a tragical story about your lack of compassion towards men. If THAT isn't sad and dark and gritty, I don't know what is.

Yeah, this really seems to get to the heart of that matter. Because, really, what is more tragic than people being taught to withhold empathy from half of humanity?

[Leliel]

Yeah, this really seems to get to the heart of that matter. Because, really, what is more tragic than people being taught to withhold empathy from half of humanity?

If you are making the quiet snark I think you are:

http://i0.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/000/034/706/winternet.jpg?1318992465

[Froggie]

So, you are saying that tragedy is not possible without sexism, because of sexism, and because of that, women should not complain about sexism, so that the poor sexist men can have their tragedies, which they need so desperately?

What?

If you can't write a tragedy without sexism against women, because violence against men doesn't make you feel anything (because you're sexist), then the solution is not to write sexism against women. The solution is to get rid of your internalized sexism.
Or, possibly, write a tragical story about your lack of compassion towards men. If THAT isn't sad and dark and gritty, I don't know what is.


I have no idea how you came to that conclusion. Please explain your reasoning because you're putting words in my mouth here.

What I was actually saying is that in the current sexist climate women are seen as more deserving of sympathy. Because of that men need to be shown to be brutalized worse than women to get the same response from the audience, and they need to show themselves worthy of sympathy, something that women don't need to do. A female character is presented as good by default, thereby deserving sympathy simply because she exists. She needs to show herself to be evil to loose audience sympathy.
With men it's the other way around. At the very best men are presented as neutral, and at worse they're presented as inherently bad when introduced. They then have to show they're worthy of sympathy for the audience to care about them.

To get rid of this kind of sexism you'd need to make the public aware that violence against men and women are as bad, not worse when it's perpetrated against women, as is the current standard. This also includes seeing violence perpetrated by men and women as equally bad.
This is not what is currently practiced. Not in media and certainly not in court.

I think that you misunderstood or willfully misinterpreted my post as something more extreme than it was.
Tragedy is completely possible to write without using a woman as a victim. It is just easier and quicker to get the audience to sympathize with a woman than with a man because we've been raised to think of women as inherently good and worthy of sympathy, something that is not true for men. It therefore takes more time and effort to get the audience to care about a man being tortured, and as such not enough authors go that route. Maybe it's laziness or maybe they actually think that no one will think it's horrible when a man is tortured. I don't really know, I don't have insider knowledge into this stuff.

I do agree that it'd be refreshing to see a story about how modern society has been desensitized to violence against men, but considering that your post is rather snarky and seem to treat men that bring this up as whiners I don't really know if you were sincere or just mocking in proposing the idea.

[Terraoblivion]

If you are making the quiet snark I think you are:

http://i0.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/000/034/706/winternet.jpg?1318992465

I wasn't really trying to snark. I really do think that it's quite tragic if a large number of people are taught not to feel any empathy for men and to see the ability to feel sorry for someone as a sign of the weakness of the ones they're feeling sorry for. Not sure what you thought I meant, though.

[Lorsa]

This thread has moved extremely fast. It must have taken me some 5-6 hours to read through it all (and I have, almost). I believe it would be a shame to close it before everyone that wants to say something has been given the time to do so.

I am glad that this type of thread is allowed to exist, it's obvious that people want to discuss these issues because they're brought up time and time again. Also, it's a very important issue.

So what do I want to say? Not sure actually and all the things I wanted to quote in the beginning has now eluded me. But I want to say something (participating in discussion, yay!).

It's interesting that nowhere in this thread has anyone defined exactly what sexism is. To me there seem to be a few different positions on this, taken from the various arguments people have put forward. It is generally very bad to discuss something you're not clear on the definition of.

I tend to follow the definition listed on wikipedia: prejudice or discrimination based on a person's sex. Personally I think this is a good solid definition and I see no reason to try to change it into something else (because then we'd need a new word for this).

So what can we learn from that? Well, sexism is twofold; it involves prejudice or discrimination.

Prejudice usually comes from adhering to stereotypes and I believe it affects all sexes in equal proportion (note that sexism refers to a persons sex, if we're talking about gender it would be genderism?). It's been made clear on another thread quite recently that stereotypes are bad regardless if they're "positive" or "negative" and in general being prejudist is a bad way to go through life. I believe we need to get rid of all stereotypes, regardless if they're based on sex, race (whatever is race anyway?), sexuality, hair-color or whatever. They simply do not accurately describe the world.

In reference to stereotypes and prejudice, it's important to remember how logic works because I've seen a few arguments that are faulty in this area.

You can use yourself and your own experience to discredit a stereotype; as in "the idea that men are competitive is not correct because I am not competitive" or "the idea that men prefer hot scantily-clad women in fantasy art is not correct because I do not prefer that". What you can not do, is to use yourself and your own experience to build a stereotype such as "I and the men I have met are competitive thus men are competitive" or "the men I have seen playing female PCs have not conformed to my expectations of how women should behave thus men can not accurately portray female characters in RPGs".

Using yourself as a baseline for how everyone of a sex thinks or behaves is being prejudist towards a certain sex and therefore sexist. I have seen some arguments in this thread being presented in such a manner.

Do stereotypes necessarily have to lead to prejudist behavior? No. It is quite possible for there to exist stereotypes without people having preconceptions of people they meet based on said stereotypes. But when you find yourself saying things like "men are" or "women are" or "no man would" or "no woman would" then you're being prejudist and in extention sexist.

You could say "most men are" or "the majority of women are" but then you run into a burden of proof that you really shouldn't walk into. It's better to simply accept that PEOPLE are different. You could say things like "the majority of men I have met" but since those are overall a fairly small amount of people very few general conclusions can be based on such experience.

Discrimination is also something that happens to all sexes. Some people believe it happens disproportionally towards women, or that the discrimination towards women is of such nature that is worse than that towards men. I would be one of those people but again the burden of proof for this is quite extensive.

It is my personal belief that discrimination in TTRPGs, and society in general is most often directed towards women. That doesn't make discrimination towards men any less sexist or less important, just that it happens less often. Discimination of all kinds is bad so this is obviously something we should work on, so that the hobby becomes more inclusive and more people can enjoy the wonders that is roleplaying.

With this in mind, it is important to remember what exactly discrimination is. Again, using the wikipedia definition, it implies treating a group of people worse than you'd treat people in general, excluding a certain group or allowing them less priviledge.

For example; not allowing female characters to be fully min-maxed fighters due to restricting their strength is allowing them less priviledge, therefore discriminating and sexist. The argument for this is usually "women are less strong compared to men" which is prejudist or "women are on average less strong than men" which may be true but it leads to an investigation of the physiological differences between men and women and if the only conclusion of this fairly complex area is "women should have lower strength attribute than men" then all I can say is: most RPG systems can not accurately model the differences between sexes. If for some reason your only conclusion from such complex differences is "women should have lower strength" then you're most likely being prejudist (and in extension sexist).

But physiology aside; no matter the reason it IS discriminating and therefore sexist. You can choose to have a sexist game but you can't pretend it's something else.

Another example would be restricting classes based on sex; it's again not awarding the same priviledges so it would be sexist. This happens sometimes in RPGs, and the kind of sexism that I would consider tolerable (because I don't like it when things are bland) as long as all sexes are being restricted equally much. Equal sexism for both sides do not cancel eachother out however, it's just that I personally would find it acceptable.

Having societies in the world that are sexist does not in itself make the work sexist, but if there's only patriarchial societies then you're not awarding the same priviledges to both sexes to play in a society that would be sexist "in their favor" and thus you are discriminating ergo being sexist. Some worlds that are sexist in this way could be acceptable to me as long as there are other worlds that make up for it so that over the entire hobby there's enough options that noone have to feel excluded. Variety is good after all.

Artwork would fall under "potentially discriminating". Work of art can be many things; people mention titilating, identifying or purely inspirational. There's nothing intrinsically wrong with titilating art, or art meant to for people to identify with, but if it's excluding the possibilities for either sex for one or both then there's something wrong. It would be impossible for a book to feature all of the above for every character class that is being portrayed as art so therefore you must judge the work as a whole. Ideally I believe there should be art that both sexes can identify with and can find titilating and that is inspirational. Now the question moves to what people find they can or want to identify with and what they might find titilating and the only thing I can say is: it differs from person to person. Thus I believe there should be variety.

Claiming only men can find visual work titilating is a prejudice and therefore sexist. Claiming women can't identify with scantily-clad girls is also being prejudist and sexist. The important thing would be variety and that the artwork isn't excluding one sex from the same experiences as is availible to the other sex.

As a side note, I find women in real full plate armor to be kind of hot. Depends on a bit on the face of course...

It is possible some of my conclusions are wrong, but I do believe it is important for any discussion to first understand what is being discussed so we can all follow the logical conclusions and reasonings behind arguments. Also, to understand how anything occurs you must first understand what it is.

Oh, and unless it was clear; I think sexism is bad.

EDIT: I welcome discussion and am always open for the possibility that I could be wrong and am willing to change my mind; that is how we grow as individuals.

[Black Jester]

... and thus Lorsa single-handedly increased the quality of the discussion through one single post.
Very good contribution here!

[Leliel]

I wasn't really trying to snark. I really do think that it's quite tragic if a large number of people are taught not to feel any empathy for men and to see the ability to feel sorry for someone as a sign of the weakness of the ones they're feeling sorry for. Not sure what you thought I meant, though.

Ah, I thought you were quietly snarking at the hypocrisy of saying "What about the menz?" when women are treated pretty poorly too.

As it is, this is also a good argument. Gender stereotypes hurt everyone, including men. I'll let the internet coupon stand.

[Terraoblivion]

No, I get what Themrys was trying to say. And really, it's not about how men are being hurt, it's about how empathy is essentially about weakness in this perception and how women are being framed as weak. It reduces the standing of women to hold this view, that is to say suggesting that women are weak and fragile things in ways men aren't, while also reducing the standing of empathy and compassion. It does hurt men too, though.

Also, well, if you're so stunted that you don't feel anything for half the population then you probably have a fairly unpleasant life yourself due to all the cognitive dissonance and nastiness you have to portray.

[Vamphyr]

Lorsa, very nice post.

There are a couple things I'd like to point out though. I was of the same mindset of saying "most men," etc. until I read a commentary (the name of the person currently eludes me) that says it's better to use definitive terms.

Now, I can say "most men are sexist and hold inherently misogynistic values" but what this does is give the person I'm talking to (assuming it's another man) wiggle room to mentally remove himself from that equation. Saying to himself "well that's not me!"

By using definitive statements, you force the other people you speak to (because women can hold a lot of internalized sexism and misogyny as well) to stop and think "wait... am I part of the problem?" Once they begin to question if their actions and behaviors are part of the problem, people, and the overall quality of life, gets better.

Also, I used to think of men too when it came to sexism, but I've found it's really not necessary. As a white, heterosexual, cis male I thought I was being fair by including everyone. Over time though I realized it wasn't equality that was making me include myself into these statistics, it was my own ego.

Now, this may not be the case with everyone, and i am in no way trying to insult you, Lorsa, I just want to highlight my experience to see if it might help you.

I realized that I was incapable of looking beyond myself and empathize with what was happening with others. Once I put myself out of the way and recognized the privilege I had been afforded in life, I was able to begin understanding the difficulties that others, particularly women and people of color, face every day.

It was also at this point that I looked at the "in good fun" humor my friends and I engaged in and realized how horribly misogynistic and racist it was.

And I know someone has stated it before, but the definition of sexism is kind of out of date, currently a lot of new definitions that are coming up involve the fact that sexism towards women (the patriarchy) is a systemized institution.

So some women may be prejudiced or discriminate against men, but not on the scale or effectiveness that men can discriminate or be prejudiced against women.

I hope that makes sense and constructively adds to the discussion :smalleek:

[Scow2]

Men in general do profit from gender roles being assigned to both sexes, but that's not the same thing.So do women.

Frankly... I don't have a problem with gender roles in general serving as social guidelines and mild pressure. But I do have a problem with Enforced Gender Roles where the pressure to conform makes it tortuous to break out of them.

[Serpentine]

So do women.Not to nearly the same extent. And the extent to which it has started to even out has been very hard-won.

[Froggie]

No, I get what Themrys was trying to say. And really, it's not about how men are being hurt, it's about how empathy is essentially about weakness in this perception and how women are being framed as weak. It reduces the standing of women to hold this view, that is to say suggesting that women are weak and fragile things in ways men aren't, while also reducing the standing of empathy and compassion. It does hurt men too, though.

Also, well, if you're so stunted that you don't feel anything for half the population then you probably have a fairly unpleasant life yourself due to all the cognitive dissonance and nastiness you have to portray.


It's not saying that only women are weak, it's saying that only women have the right to be weak and still receive help because of it. Saying that it hurts men too is dismissing the fact that men are indeed seen as uniformly less weak than women, but it is at the cost of not being allowed weakness.

That is not hurting men too, it's sexism which is separate from the sexist belief that women are weak in general. Even if women were seen as strong that wouldn't necessarily free men from the expectation to always be strong because the two are not directly linked.

It's something like a coin where one side represents expectation and the other represents demand. Men are expected to be strong and the stereotype is that a man is strong. They get approval when they are, but at the same time it's demanded of them that they be strong which means that they get scorn if they're not.
Likewise women aren't expected to be strong by default and they're not seen as stereotypically strong. They don't get the same praise for showing that they are. At the same time this means that it's not demanded of them, and they don't get scorn for not being strong.

To take another example, which albeit not diametrically opposed is often cited as similar.

Women are expected to be beautiful and that's what the stereotype is that a woman is beautiful. Women get praised for being beautiful, indeed it's often the most prevalent topic when praising a woman, but it's also demanded of women to be beautiful and they get scorn when they're not.
Men are not expected to be beautiful (or whatever word you use for describing attractive men) and the stereotypical man is not presented as such. If a man is attractive it's possible for him to get praise for it, albeit difficult as the cries of vanity rings a lot sooner for a man than for a woman, but they don't really get any scorn for not being beautiful.


Afterthought edit: As others have said, it's not the roles themselves that's the real issue, it's the rigidity with which they're assigned. It's only when you don't have any real choice that preference becomes a prison.

Also, ask the men in the trenches if they feel like their gender role comes with any great disadvantages.

[Themrys]

So some women may be prejudiced or discriminate against men, but not on the scale or effectiveness that men can discriminate or be prejudiced against women.

I hope that makes sense and constructively adds to the discussion :smalleek:


The internalized sexism of women is not, mainly "being prejudiced against men", it's being prejudiced against other women, or even themselves.

And I have yet to meet a female misandrist who is not the first and possibly only victim of her misandrism. Because women as a group have no power over men as a group, women who arrive at the conclusion that "men are pigs" do not dump their boyfriends who behave like pigs, but stay with them, in the belief that, as heterosexual women, they cannot hope to be loved by a human being, anyway, and are stuck with pigs. Who is hurt by that? Certainly not the boyfriend, who gets to keep his girlfriend in spite of his behaviour towards her.


@Froggie: You just have to look at the post to which my post was the reply to see that I could not understand your answer in any other possible way than I did in that context. I will not reply to your posts in the future, as I am tired of trying to educate people who are too lazy to check their privilege or at least think two minutes about what their words actually imply.

[Scow2]

Not to nearly the same extent. And the extent to which it has started to even out has been very hard-won.How did 50% of the population end up in such a situation in the first place, anyway?

And aside from that... Egalitarianism is up there with Libertarianism, World Peace, and Anarcho-Communism that are strived for and idealized into a Utopia, but stymied not only by artificially-constructed social barriers, but ecological and biological ones as well... and while the biological ones are extremely elusive and ill-understood, they're still very much present and causing problems.

There are a many feasible things that work, but the response isn't to try to achieve equality by shooting down the privileged, but by extending that privilege to those who lack it. Unfortunately, that won't happen until Cortical Stacks and The Mesh are invented.

Because women as a group have no power over men as a group.{{scrubbed}}

Women have lots of power, individually and collectively. It's a much different power than men have, but it's still there, even if they ignore that they have (Even as they use it to its full extent)

Also, you speak as though women are more often abused by their boyfriends than the other way around, which is not true. Sure, it's more prosecuted and decried by society, but that's because female-on-male domestic violence is treated as a norm (Or even desireable)

[crazyhedgewizrd]

Lorsa, very nice post . . . discussion :smalleek:

As a normal White Hetro Male, I feel your pain in having to hate yourself, so you can feel the pain of women and coloured people. With how little Privilege we have left we have to run to the bell towers and scream how Privilege we are over the rest of people. It is our fault for what are forefathers did and we have to apologise for the rest of our lifes.



If you don't get it, I'm being sarcastic. If we don't start to say we are a part of society and what happens affects us too, the divide that's happening to men and woman will only get bigger.

[Vamphyr]

The internalized sexism of women is not, mainly "being prejudiced against men", it's being prejudiced against other women, or even themselves.

And I have yet to meet a female misandrist who is not the first and possibly only victim of her misandrism. Because women as a group have no power over men as a group, women who arrive at the conclusion that "men are pigs" do not dump their boyfriends who behave like pigs, but stay with them, in the belief that, as heterosexual women, they cannot hope to be loved by a human being, anyway, and are stuck with pigs. Who is hurt by that? Certainly not the boyfriend, who gets to keep his girlfriend in spite of his behaviour towards her.

Yes, thank you for pointing that out. I know internalized misogyny is the most harmful to women, I was mostly just trying to put what Lorsa was saying into a new light to make it clear that women are the ones who suffer the most from it. I even stated earlier In my post that women can hold a lot of internalized misogyny and sexism.

I was being unclear though, so thank you for helping set that straight!

[Froggie]

Hmm, now that I reread it it does seem to hastily put together.
The point was meant as general, not as absolute, but maybe it didn't come across as that at all. That would be me not understand the difference of having me and no others having insight into my own mind though, not unchecked privilege. Unless one could count living in my head as privilege.

Women as a group do have power over men as a group though. That is, if you don't think there's some serious backdoor deals regarding votes of women, then women totally have power over men as a group. If they actually use that power is another story, but the power is there.

How does a woman being misandrist change her situation if it has no consequence in if she leaves her ******* (edit: sorry, I said a nono) of a boyfriend or not though? Her being a misandrist doesn't really change her situation at all. Feeling that she is unworthy of love and staying because of that would be internalized misogyny, not misandry, right? Or have I missed a couple of logical steps?

Also, not seeing that women can hurt men by being misandrist, isn't that also possible invisible privilege?


Do ignore my answers at your call. Even if it might seem so I'm not really answering as a personal debate, but as a way to lift topics I find interesting.

[Frozen_Feet]

"gallows humour" can only be made by done who are about to be hanged, not by those who ordered the execution. You need to be aware of this.

And you need to realize that the gallows humor can exist within the context of the game, even if the one playing the game is not subject to the horrors that happen within it. Pretty much the whole genre of horror is built on this premise - the ability to safely face and deal with repulsive and horrifying content.

If there is a female character suffering in a game, and her suffering is portrayed in properly negative light, and the she cracks a joke about it - that is legitimate gallows humor, even if the player or designer happened to be a man.


And I don't see why you have to torture women for "tragedy". You can have just as much tragedy with torturing men.

As has been pointed out, you can't, not with the same level of effort. There's a long-standing tradition of men being considered expendable and unsympathetic. So when a hack writer wants to play on emotions of his audience, he takes the easy way out and targets more sympathetic victim, like women and children, or even better, little girls.

But I fear this is starting to work against itself. Because the reason why males are considered expendable, is that violence towards males is trivial. It happens all the time, is visible all the time, and is even considered justified such as in contexts of military service and law-enforcement system. Feminist rhetoric on how "every man is a potential rapist" is not helping. It makes both women and other men lose sympathy for men.

This holds true in context of games too. We have videos complaining about Zelda getting kidnapped, but does anyone care of the poor moblins Link commits horrible violence towards thousands of times more often? Does anyone raise a stink when Ganondorf, a chiefly masculine figure, is demonized and has a sword rammed through his head?

How does this relate to female suffering in games, you ask? Well, you can strike a nerve only so many times before it becomes numb. At some point, cheaply harping on emotions of the male audience stops working, and they no longer see the damsel in distress as a sympathetic figure. They begin to see her as dead weight. And thus, to get the same effect, the violence towards women has to get worse. Games in recent years have become increasingly extreme in their portrayal of violence - as evidenced by Anita Sarkesiaan, even.

This causes two things: one, violence towards women is trivialized, while two, the double standard of how violence is condemned in regards to women but not in regards to men becomes increasingly more obvious.

And I think the raise in misogyny is based on a faulty conclusion based on this observation. Namely: if no-one cares about violence towards men in games, why should we care about violence towards women? Let's subject both sexes to the same standard: guilty unless proven innocent, worthless unless proven useful, and free prey unless protected by themselves.

And thus, when women complain about sexism in game, they are met with scorn and ridicule, because the double standard still largely exists in real life. Can't the women see they are the ones with privilege? Namely, the freedom from male standards of violence towards other males.

Because those standards are not nice. I know because I've gotten into fights over this double standard - real, knuckle-to-face fights. Because other men who would "rather die than hit a girl" considered it perfectly fine to pick on a weaker man (=me) for no reason other than wanting to fight.

Equality between sexes is all well and good, but not all kinds of equality are desireable. Because let's face it, this is where biology plays its part. Men are bigger and stronger than women, so if men start considering women as threats or attack them for no reason, the consequences are disastrous for the women. We have societies where this is true, and they are not good places to be.

Saying that violence towards men should be portrayed in negative light too is the opposite, equally valid, and infinitely better solution. But as long as violence sells, it's empty speech. We're starting to reach a point where the true enemy is no longer sexism - the discrimination between men and women. We're starting to reach the point where the real problem is trivilization of violence, and its economical condonement in our entertainment by male and female players alike.

---

Now, to Lorsa:


It's been made clear on another thread quite recently that stereotypes are bad regardless if they're "positive" or "negative" and in general being prejudist is a bad way to go through life. I believe we need to get rid of all stereotypes, regardless if they're based on sex, race (whatever is race anyway?), sexuality, hair-color or whatever. They simply do not accurately describe the world.

...

Discimination of all kinds is bad so this is obviously something we should work on, so that the hobby becomes more inclusive and more people can enjoy the wonders that is roleplaying.

Are they? Is it?

Lets face it, stereotypes don't appear from thin air. They are generalization errors, but you can't have such errors unless you have something to generalize from. You don't have stereotypes without people acting like them.

It is a positive feedback loop, or in more common terms, a vicious circle. X reinforces or causes Y, and Y reinforces or causes X in turn. When people get associated with certain behaviour, those behaviour will in turn get associated with them, and the people will face pressure to conform.

Stereotypical thinking is a pervasive flaw of human minds. We generalize, and we generalize automatically. As such, I don't think we can ever rid human society from stereotypes. What we can do, is to change what those stereotypes are and how they are enforced, or not enforced.

Same goes for discrimination. People discriminate naturally; but more to the point, they discriminate for reasons, and sometimes those reasons are completely valid.

Or is it wrong to discriminate against sociopathic or narcistic behaviour? Wrong to discriminate against those who break the laws? Wrong to discriminate against those who pick a fight with a stranger for no other reason?

Once you say "all disrcimination is wrong, regardless of reason!", you stand on quicksand and have become unable to properly judge any person as good, bad, neutral, lawful, chaotic or plain stupid. In fact, even blaming people for sexism becomes intellectually dishonest. Faulting people and, say, choosing to leave their games due to sexism is a form of discrimination towards the sexists; and if all discrimination is bad, regardless of reason, you are being a hypocrite, one who fights bigotry by being bigoted towards the bigots.

I'm not saying there aren't baseless, harmful stereotypes. I'm not saying there aren't baseless, harmful forms of discrimination. I'm not saying there aren't unearned, unfair privileges. It's taken for granted that these things do, in fact exist.

But even if some stereotypes are bad, are all of them so? Even if some disrcimination is bad, is all of it? Does the existence of unearned, unfair privileges exclude the possibility of earner, fair privileges?

[Scow2]

Saying that violence towards men should be portrayed in negative light too is the opposite, equally valid, and infinitely better solution. But as long as violence sells, it's empty speech. We're starting to reach a point where the true enemy is no longer sexism - the discrimination between men and women. We're starting to reach the point where the real problem is trivilization of violence, and its economical condonement in our entertainment by male and female players alike.And this will never happen, because violence is Fun and Awesome, and getting rid of it will make life boring and unentertaining, and by extension, useless.

[Froggie]

Frozen_Feet explains my thought in a much more clear manner than I seem to be able to.

I agree that the solution is not holding women to the same sexist standards as men regarding violence, but the opposite.
View men as beings deserving of as much protection and sympathy as women, not the other way around.

Scow2

You don't have to get rid of violence in media altogether, just the senseless killing of men as faceless enemies without sympathy. It means getting rid of Storm Troopers, not the dueling with Darth Vader.

There's also the vested interest society has in having everyone see men as expendable. You can't fight wars without soldiers, and if men are seen as human and not as soldiers it becomes tough to motivate them to die for king and country.
Men feeling that they have to risk their lives because they're men and therefore less worthy of protection would probably be a good example of internalized misandry.

[Scow2]

Scow2

You don't have to get rid of violence in media altogether, just the senseless killing of men as faceless enemies without sympathy. It means getting rid of Storm Troopers, not the dueling with Darth Vader.But blasting stormtroopers is even more fun and entertaining than the dramatic duel with Darth Vader. (Possibly Anti-)Heroic rampages are fun and awesome to watch.


There's also the vested interest society has in having everyone see men as expendable. You can't fight wars without soldiers, and if men are seen as human and not as soldiers it becomes tough to motivate them to die for king and country.
Men feeling that they have to risk their lives because they're men and therefore less worthy of protection would probably be a good example of internalized misandry.Meh, Jingoism and warfare lead to awesome music in addition to violence. War is a Glorious Hell

You have to take the bad with the good.

[Werekat]

And thus, when women complain about sexism in game, they are met with scorn and ridicule, because the double standard still largely exists in real life. Can't the women see they are the ones with privilege? Namely, the freedom from male standards of violence towards other males.

Because those standards are not nice. I know because I've gotten into fights over this double standard - real, knuckle-to-face fights. Because other men who would "rather die than hit a girl" considered it perfectly fine to pick on a weaker man (=me) for no reason other than wanting to fight.

You make an interesting argument. But I'll note that as society stands today, women are only safe from violence while men... Consider them to be 'real women.' The moment she stops being a 'woman' and becomes 'insert expletive of choice,' that illusory 'protection' is dispelled. And suddenly she becomes a target - and without even a chance to prepare for it. This reframing can come at the drop of a hat, and most women are not prepared for it.

I think it would have been a better and more honest society if women were told upfront that they're not really safe and that 'wouldn't hit a girl' is an illusion, and a dangerous one at that.

I've never believed in it, and have always fought when I saw a fight was about to break out, but I've had to wipe the tears of several women who used to. I'll also note that when a fight is already underway, no one thinks of leniency.

[Lorsa]

Now, to Lorsa:

Lets face it, stereotypes don't appear from thin air. They are generalization errors, but you can't have such errors unless you have something to generalize from. You don't have stereotypes without people acting like them.

It is a positive feedback loop, or in more common terms, a vicious circle. X reinforces or causes Y, and Y reinforces or causes X in turn. When people get associated with certain behaviour, those behaviour will in turn get associated with them, and the people will face pressure to conform.

Stereotypical thinking is a pervasive flaw of human minds. We generalize, and we generalize automatically. As such, I don't think we can ever rid human society from stereotypes. What we can do, is to change what those stereotypes are and how they are enforced, or not enforced.

This is not a thread to discuss the potential benefits and drawbacks of stereotypes, but in a way I think what you wrote itself shows why stereotypes are problematic. You mention them as being "generalization errors" and "flawed thinking". Thus it seems like you're actually arguing FOR why sterotypes are a problem. I believe erronous and flawed thinking to be a problem and not something I want to engage in; thus I avoid stereotypes.

Also, if you see it as a "vicious cycle", with vicious usually referring to something bad, you've again acknowledged the problem.

In the end, the idea that "humans form stereotypes automatically" is itself also a stereotype and do not have to be correct. Also, even if it was correct, that does not imply it wouldn't be beneficial to challenge your own thinking and evaluate if you've made such generalization errors and why they occured. I personally try to avoid such flawed thinking as much as possible.

It's true that they do not appear from thin air, and investigating the reasons of their appearance is definitely worthwhile. Furthermore it is as you say very good to try and limit how they are enforced. I'm not convinced that it's impossible to educate people to form fewer stereotypes and do less generalization errors however.


Same goes for discrimination. People discriminate naturally; but more to the point, they discriminate for reasons, and sometimes those reasons are completely valid.

Or is it wrong to discriminate against sociopathic or narcistic behaviour? Wrong to discriminate against those who break the laws? Wrong to discriminate against those who pick a fight with a stranger for no other reason?

Once you say "all disrcimination is wrong, regardless of reason!", you stand on quicksand and have become unable to properly judge any person as good, bad, neutral, lawful, chaotic or plain stupid. In fact, even blaming people for sexism becomes intellectually dishonest. Faulting people and, say, choosing to leave their games due to sexism is a form of discrimination towards the sexists; and if all discrimination is bad, regardless of reason, you are being a hypocrite, one who fights bigotry by being bigoted towards the bigots.

Typically I believe discrimination is done against people and groups not against behaviors. Yes, it is wrong to discriminate against sociopaths, but you certainly shouldn't allow sociopathic behavior. Those are two very different things.

I do admit that there may be situations where discrimination can be valid, examples to convince me of this are welcome. However, just because someone commited a crime and recieved punishment for it, doesn't mean it's okay to do further discrimination towards said person like refuse them work or the like. Our laws are meant to restrict certain behaviors, and having them in place is in itself not discrimination.

Also, what does judging someone as good, bad or whatever have to do with discrimination against groups of people?

Blaming people for sexism isn't discriminating; but excluding sexist people from activities is. I believe that would be sexistism. Some people might consider sexistism a valid form of discrimination whereas I do not. What I am going to do however, is to restrict their behavior within a group (if I have the authority to do so). Also, choosing not to participate in an activity where people have behaviors you do not like to be exposed to isn't discriminating. Unless you consider your own presence to be a priviledge... I suppose any argument can run into issues when taken to their extremes.

Short story: there's a difference between people and behavior. Also, deciding whom you spend time with or not should not be considered discrimination otherwise you'd run into the problem of being forced to spend time with everyone on the planet that wants to be in your presence.

I do realize some of these arguments run into logical greyzones, but I am sure you can understand what message I am trying to convey.


I'm not saying there aren't baseless, harmful stereotypes. I'm not saying there aren't baseless, harmful forms of discrimination. I'm not saying there aren't unearned, unfair privileges. It's taken for granted that these things do, in fact exist.

But even if some stereotypes are bad, are all of them so? Even if some disrcimination is bad, is all of it? Does the existence of unearned, unfair privileges exclude the possibility of earner, fair privileges?

Many stereotypes are and much discrimination is. Enough that it is a problem that needs to be adressed. All these arguments also exist in a topic about sexism so that is the context they need to be viewed in. And I believe it's better to start from a standpoint of "discrimination is bad" and then work out where individual discrimination might be valid than the other way around and assume that it is valid and then work out where it's not.

As for priviledge, it is a tricky thing. One could argue that priviledges based on behavior or accomplishments would be okay but the argument against that is that not everyone has the same intrinsic capability for all behaviors or accomplishments. I haven't formed a clear opinion on this matter yet but I believe there are some base priviledges that should be extended to everyone.

[Kalmageddon]

{{scrubbed}}



Thank you for providing an adequate summary.

This discussion shouldn't even be on the Roleplaying Games board, it doesn't have anything to do with roleplaying, rather it went in "discuss everything sexist" mode.
I'd kindly ask a mod to move it in a more appropriate section because it's disturbing to see the obsession this forum has when it comes to gender issues plastered in not one but two threads on a board that SHOULD be about roleplaying games.

[Themrys]

You make an interesting argument. But I'll note that as society stands today, women are only safe from violence while men... Consider them to be 'real women.' The moment she stops being a 'woman' and becomes 'insert expletive of choice,' that illusory 'protection' is dispelled. And suddenly she becomes a target - and without even a chance to prepare for it. This reframing can come at the drop of a hat, and most women are not prepared for it.

I think it would have been a better and more honest society if women were told upfront that they're not really safe and that 'wouldn't hit a girl' is an illusion, and a dangerous one at that.

I've never believed in it, and have always fought when I saw a fight was about to break out, but I've had to wipe the tears of several women who used to. I'll also note that when a fight is already underway, no one thinks of leniency.


I have seen that reframing happen in the internet more times than I can think of. Men who try to appear as gentlemanly by claiming that they wouldn't hit women, are often the worst a**holes you meet, and use sexist and sexualized insults at the drop of a hat.

In my experience, the only men you can trust to not attack women are the ones who don't attack anyone, anyway.

There is no sexism that is good for women. There are, at best, men who acknowledge that women are oppressed and that this is not fair and needs to be remedied as good as it can be.
When the valiant knight rescues the distressed damsel, what does he rescue her from? Other men, most likely.

[Amphetryon]

I have seen that reframing happen in the internet more times than I can think of. Men who try to appear as gentlemanly by claiming that they wouldn't hit women, are often the worst a**holes you meet, and use sexist and sexualized insults at the drop of a hat.

In my experience, the only men you can trust to not attack women are the ones who don't attack anyone, anyway.

There is no sexism that is good for women. There are, at best, men who acknowledge that women are oppressed and that this is not fair and needs to be remedied as good as it can be.
When the valiant knight rescues the distressed damsel, what does he rescue her from? Other men, most likely.

As this topic is, ostensibly, about sexism in the realm of table-top gaming, I read this as indicating that when a female Character is attacked by a male Character (including an NPC/monster), this is a sexist act. Presumably (because no qualifiers were put in the above-quoted passage that I can see), this is true regardless of provocation, or the role that the female Character has in the game: a female Barbarian in full Rage who gets hit by the male Hobgoblin she's in the process of disemboweling is engaging in a sexist act by virtue of the attack.

Similarly - though this is not directly implied by the quoted commentary above - a male Character (again, including NPCs or monsters) who declines to attack a female Character because he won't hit a female is engaging in a form of sexism, because he's exhibiting discriminatory behavior on the basis of gender.

[Frozen_Feet]

You make an interesting argument. But I'll note that as society stands today...

Which society?

This is a real, important question, and ignoring it has undermined feminism in the past. There is not The Society. There is not The Patriarchy. There are societies, and there patriarchies, plural form, small letters. And they are different from each other. Global culture is fractured to myriad pieces that are very different and not equal.



In the end, the idea that "humans form stereotypes automatically" is itself also a stereotype and do not have to be correct.

But it is a verifiable, psychological, social and biological fact. Read, for example "Thinking Fast and Slow", "And man created gods: Religion Explained", "How to control a mind?" and myriad other studies on this aspect of human existence.

You are entirely correct that people can examine their thoughts, and form better logic and opinions, and I agree they should do so.

But once we decide from the get-go to paint the default, everyday form of human thought as inherently "bad", we're standing on very flimsy ground.


Typically I believe discrimination is done against people and groups not against behaviors.

This is magical thinking. (Reading the above books would help understand what I mean by this.) Every group of people is made from inviduals who engage in behaviours, and pretty much all forms of discrimination are based on restricting those inviduals from certain behaviours.

It is possible to discriminate against a group for no reason, based on no action, and that kind of baseless discrimination I agree is bad. But that is neither only or most common form of discrimination.


Our laws are meant to restrict certain behaviors, and having them in place is in itself not discrimination.

Certain behaviours, like perhaps women getting abortion? "Laws meant to restrict certain behaviours" is pretty much definition of institutional discrimination.

I think it has been a very bad move from the field of sociology to bake in "unfair" into the very definition of the word. More generally, discrimination is value neutral form of discernment, "The act or process of exhibiting keen insight and good judgment."

In the same way, in colloquial feminist rethoric, "unearned" has been baked into the very definition of "male privilege". I feel this creates a very toxic environment for discussion, and is prone to causing communication errors, because in ordinary speech, the word "privilege" does not in itself imply it's unearned.


Also, what does judging someone as good, bad or whatever have to do with discrimination against groups of people?

Because when you judge a certain behaviour is crime, that means juding the people who behave that way as criminals. So on and so forth. Groups are made of inviduals; hence, discrimination of groups always begins with judgement of inviduals.

[Poison_Fish]

I'm going to tell you a joke. It's a sexist joke, so sue me. :smalltongue:

*Ahem* Here goes: women's studies is a field for angry young women who don't have what it takes to do real studies.

More seriously, I do percieve the existence and prevalence of sociology and women studies in female academics to be concerning. Why? Because around these parts, they don't give a real future to many of the girls who go and study them. And they are girls, overwhelmingly so. But what is the actual result? They become freelance journalists or elementary school teachers at best. At worst, they are forced to switch fields, and end up doing a job they could've entered with three years less of education, and we get to read once more how women in workplaces are "more educated than men".

It is fairly ironic for feminists to complain of the wage gap, when it would do far more to close that gap for women studies to be banned and for girls who take it educate themselves to be plumber, construction workers or electricians.

Please do not speak from ignorance (http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&ved=0CDcQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.asanet.org%2Fresearch%2FBache lorsinSociology.pdf&ei=ZBRkUvmtOuT52AWSrYFQ&usg=AFQjCNHZ-oY-NdszuunwCykx84Z4xSyqPw&sig2=tegJmP8lmzOzxkTzgt0cfg&bvm=bv.54934254,d.b2I&cad=rja). Gender studies has a sociological bent because it uses sociological and anthropological methodology with a specific focus towards gender. Career outcomes are similar to those with a sociology or anthropology degree. Career outcomes are nowhere close as "no future" for those.

[Water_Bear]

\This discussion shouldn't even be on the Roleplaying Games board, it doesn't have anything to do with roleplaying, rather it went in "discuss everything sexist" mode.
I'd kindly ask a mod to move it in a more appropriate section because it's disturbing to see the obsession this forum has when it comes to gender issues plastered in not one but two threads on a board that SHOULD be about roleplaying games.

Seconded.

The only benefit to this thread so far has been that it shows that people here are largely unwilling to accept this kind of nonsense, even when the mods put their fingers on the scale in favor of it.

[Frozen_Feet]

Please do not speak from ignorance (http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&ved=0CDcQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.asanet.org%2Fresearch%2FBache lorsinSociology.pdf&ei=ZBRkUvmtOuT52AWSrYFQ&usg=AFQjCNHZ-oY-NdszuunwCykx84Z4xSyqPw&sig2=tegJmP8lmzOzxkTzgt0cfg&bvm=bv.54934254,d.b2I&cad=rja). Gender studies has a sociological bent because it uses sociological and anthropological methodology with a specific focus towards gender. Career outcomes are similar to those with a sociology or anthropology degree. Career outcomes are nowhere close as "no future" for those.

... an American study, based on American graduates. What did I just say about pretending all societies are the same?

I did specify "around these parts". That would be Finland. You want to prove me wrong? Post a Finnish study on Finnish graduates.

[Terraoblivion]

Thank you for providing an adequate summary.

This discussion shouldn't even be on the Roleplaying Games board, it doesn't have anything to do with roleplaying, rather it went in "discuss everything sexist" mode.
I'd kindly ask a mod to move it in a more appropriate section because it's disturbing to see the obsession this forum has when it comes to gender issues plastered in not one but two threads on a board that SHOULD be about roleplaying games.

That "obsession" exists because this forum has some pretty major problems with sexism. If there were less people doubling down on insisting that problems are categorically impossible and it's just [insert appropriate comment about radical feminists/hysterical women/overly sensitive people] who complain there would be much less cause for debate. Basically, a lot of people here insist on providing evidence that there are major gender issues in the gaming community that need to be addressed.

[Poison_Fish]

... an American study, based on American graduates. What did I just say about pretending all societies are the same?

I did specify "around these parts". That would be Finland. You want to prove me wrong? Post a Finnish study on Finnish graduates.


http://www.eera-ecer.de/ecer-programmes/conference/8/session/6759/ (what did I say about ignorance?)

Bro, it's not just sociology. Harder fields have more resiliency then softer fields, but the declining trend is something experienced through out most highly educated populaces, and is found in most fields. In Finlands case, it still isn't "no future". You and a few others have a huge hyperbole problem. No, I am not disagreeing in the benefit of trade schools. I too think those are good. I'm just shooting down another case of doom and gloom that isn't true.

{{scrubbed}}

[Frozen_Feet]

You and a few others have a huge hyperbole problem.

That I can agree with. Apologies for the hyperbole.

[Scow2]

That "obsession" exists because this forum has some pretty major problems with sexism. If there were less people doubling down on insisting that problems are categorically impossible and it's just [insert appropriate comment about radical feminists/hysterical women/overly sensitive people] who complain there would be much less cause for debate. Basically, a lot of people here insist on providing evidence that there are major gender issues in the gaming community that need to be addressed.The world has a major problem with "Sexism" that has been socially enforced to handle significant biological differences (Largely regarding half the population having what essentially amounts to an unstable timebomb between their legs, and the other half having a completely different one, and neither knowing what to do about the other), but where that line's drawn varies from person to person.

In my experience, the only way to truly solve "Sexism" is the same way to solve any problem: If you want something done right, you have to do it yourself.

[Coidzor]

In my experience, the only way to truly solve "Sexism" is the same way to solve any problem: If you want something done right, you have to do it yourself.

So how does one do that in your line of thinking?

[Astrella]

Thank you for providing an adequate summary.

This discussion shouldn't even be on the Roleplaying Games board, it doesn't have anything to do with roleplaying, rather it went in "discuss everything sexist" mode.
I'd kindly ask a mod to move it in a more appropriate section because it's disturbing to see the obsession this forum has when it comes to gender issues plastered in not one but two threads on a board that SHOULD be about roleplaying games.

That's your call. Sexism does play a part in roleplaying games and the culture surrounding it, it's not your call to make whether or not people can have a certain discussion.

[Scow2]

So how does one do that in your line of thinking?Depends on what the problem that needs solving is. The only one that probably does need actual effort from society is promoting equal-opportunity in the entire game industry, to get a far more accurate and representative sample of perspectives.

On the local level, the answer is "Be the DM".

[Frozen_Feet]

So how does one do that in your line of thinking?

Can't speak for Scow2, but in context of games, it was already brought up: we need more women making games for (tastes and desires of) women, and we need more female players playing and mingling with male players.

As we can't force girls to play, it sorta follows that they have to make the decision to play and participate in content creation. Though we can encourage them to.

[JusticeZero]

Yeah, this really seems to get to the heart of that matter. Because, really, what is more tragic than people being taught to withhold empathy from half of humanity?
There's a long-standing tradition of men being considered expendable and unsympathetic. So when a hack writer wants to play on emotions of his audience, he takes the easy way out and targets more sympathetic victim, like women and children, or even better, little girls.
..
Can't the women see they are the ones with privilege? Namely, the freedom from male standards of violence towards other males.
This is pretty much the core of male issues with sexism. Men are reduced to disposable engines and praised for their power and ability to absorb damage without complaint. It is a nasty objectification that is rampant everywhere.
Just look at popular media. You complain about the trope of the damsel in distress. I agree that that is an issue. Here's one that hurts us, though:
"You keep going. I'll buy you some time."
You've heard that line before in movies all the time. Or some other thing like it. Say,
"The device has to be triggered manually."
You know exactly what's going to happen. Start looking to see who it happens to. It always seems to be a man.
It IS a legitimate problem, and as noted, the fallout cuts both ways.
It is severely crazymaking and frustrating when reasonable assertions of the fact that this exists and is a problem are turned around and dismissed by women (who are the privilege-holders in this case), asserting that raising that issue is sexist rather than an attempt to get rid of it.

That said, I take issue at this bit:
Men are bigger and stronger than women, so if men start considering women as threats or attack them for no reason, the consequences are disastrous for the women.This isn't actually the case. It is normally true, but it is not true because it is a fact, it is true because it is a self-fulfilling prophecy. Society tells a girl "Girls are weak", and in return, she avoids doing the things that would make her physically strong. In reality, strength and physical fitness by body size is starting to look kind've equal given a woman who was taught from a young age to push her body hard to build strength in the ways that men are often socialized to.

[Terraoblivion]

I was more concerned with the stunted form of empathy people who believe that have, than men being rendered disposable. Being expected to be powerful is just all around more beneficial than being expected to be impotent, so it's still a net benefit for men. Having empathy be something that only weak people deserves on the other hand is pretty awful. Among the many things it means is the fact that it harms people who are in some way disempowered as it makes any requests or grant of aid to them direct attacks on their dignity. But there's also the fact that it makes you a stunted person likely to not seek or want empathy or support no matter how much you need it and that applies whether you're male or female. It's just an all-around awful belief, for numerous reasons that have nothing to do with men being treated as expendable or similar.

[Black Jester]

Can't speak for Scow2, but in context of games, it was already brought up: we need more women making games for (tastes and desires of) women, and we need more female players playing and mingling with male players.

As we can't force girls to play, it sorta follows that they have to make the decision to play and participate in content creation. Though we can encourage them to.

Sounds good in theory, but has its problems when it comes to the practical implementation. And I think one can so easily turn your suggestion upside down that it is basically... how should i put it? ... putting the cart before the horse.
If you want to include more women in gaming you need to establish a more inclusive environment. You want to attract a new group of players, you need to make sure that the group in question is welcomed. Real (or, if you insist perceived) sexism is an obstacle to this process of inclusion. So basically your solution consists of the idea that for reducing sexism in gaming you basically have to reduce sexism in gaming which is basically true but not exactly helpful.

[Miriel]

I didn't read the whole thread, only the OP and last two pages. But I do want to share a personal story, which I think is relevant.

Last spring, I started playing D&D with a group of people from school. This was my first campaign. When filling out the caracter sheet of my Elvish ranger, I decided I would be an "F", because, well, why not? I had not thought about it beforehand, and it made no difference for me. + everyone else was playing a male caracter, so it made the group less uniform.

Since then, I've learnt that the stereotypical "male playing a female PC" is an overly sexualized "babe" fueling male fantasies, so I'll just say that I was not doing anything like that. I don't think she was particularly feminine, except for name (well, if you know Quenya), description and a tiny bit of backstory (she fled a forced marriage with a bandit leader by slitting his throat in the night -- I decided that after that, she slept with her scimitar ready). For the most part, she was just an Elvish Ranger. However, at least one other player didn't see it this way. Cue the "jokes" (EDIT: mostly from one person). For example, when the dwarvish guards asked us to pay 50 gp to come in, he implied that I should ask a "reduction". There were occasional "Show us/them your boobs!", whistles, etc., too. I was deeply uneasy. At some point, I said (in character) that the next time, I would attack, but I never had the courage to do anything more than an in-character slap. Most of the time, he was alone to in doing this (although the DM did some strange things too), but I didn't get overwhelming support either.

Elvish Ranger was destroyed, so I made an Elvish Wizard (I read too much Tolkien, so I'm an Elf person, optimization be damned). Another female, because the group was as male as ever, and why not? Once again, just a wizard, the ex-chancelor of an overthrown kingdom (another page-long backstory), who happened to be female. Certainly not the most sexual PC ever -- generic dark worn out robes, snobish intellectual attitude, and I think she was pretty old too --, but once again, my character's being female was oddly significant for the same player. Appart from more appeals to breast nudity and the like, there was an event in some kind of bar when he poured a potion in my drink. I trust you to get the reference. For the greater good of all of us, nothing of the like happened (my character just hallucinated for some time and wasted spells on non-existent cat people).

Both my characters had decent charisma (12 and 16 respectively, I think). When this was brought up (say, after a bluff check), there was a high risk of whistles or "Oh! Sexy!", etc. Not always only from said person, by the way.

This didn't happened in the Guild of Manly Machos for Male Supremacy, just in some random playing group. Most of them are left-of-center, AFAIK. I have heard at least one of the players hold feminist views, and at least two other show sympathy to feminist discourses. I wouldn't have expected that. When the campaign ended, I didn't join the following game.

I gather I'm not the only person who's experienced this kind of behaviour. I don't know who's at fault, I can't offer solutions, but... yeah. Sexism is a real problem in table-top roleplaying.

[Themrys]

Elvish Ranger was destroyed, so I made an Elvish Wizard (I read too much Tolkien, so I'm an Elf person, optimization be damned). Another female, because the group was as male as ever, and why not?

I would have thought the behaviour of the group towards the ranger a sufficient reason to not make another female character.

I would have left the group or played a manly barbarian warrior. Left the group, I hope, but trying to get around it by removing opportunities for sexism is a strategy I offen followed when I was younger.

[JusticeZero]

Being expected to be powerful is just all around more beneficial than being expected to be impotent, so it's still a net benefit for men.The problem with being expected to be powerful is that one is then obligated to be the one to use that power every time a situation arises that can be solved with power.
If a woman wants to be the one to take the powerful role, then, well - because culturally, men are treated as power objects, that's all they had going for them.
It's like being in a party with one "weak" sorceress and one "strong" fighter. If the sorceress decides to try her hand at being a gish, then well.. what does the fighter have? Maybe the fighter pushes back and tries to "put her in her place". Maybe the fighter just sort've fades away - "They won't get past me, save yourself!" In every case, problems are going to arise in the dynamic because "being strong" is the only thing that the guy had according to culture, and the sorceress just found out how to do that too. The solution is not to try to make sure that the guy can be strong. That was the problem in the first place. The solution is to help him branch out and become more complete. Maybe with Cleric levels so he can learn how to be a caring medic or something. ;)

Having empathy be something that only weak people deserves on the other hand is pretty awful.
..It's just an all-around awful belief, for numerous reasons that have nothing to do with men being treated as expendable or similar.
Yep. "Oh, walk it off, you big baby." I'm sorry, but whatever happened hurt a lot. I know people who've been told that when they wanted to get injuries looked at. They included things like broken bones that never healed right because they weren't set.
But the cultural message is crystal clear. "You are powerful, you are sturdy, you can shrug off whatever damage comes your way, and when it comes time to decide who needs to be saved or helped, you are last in line if you get into the queue at all. All because you were born a man."
I wouldn't consider that to be a universally advantageous position.

[Miriel]

I would have thought the behaviour of the group towards the ranger a sufficient reason to not make another female character.

I would have left the group or played a manly barbarian warrior. Left the group, I hope, but trying to get around it by removing opportunities for sexism is a strategy I offen followed when I was younger.
I'm always full of optimism, so I had hoped it would get better/that I would succeed at enlightening him. In the end, I left, though.

[Kalmageddon]

(Scrubbed)

[Miriel]

(Scrub the post, scrub the quote)
Isn't it?

Let's look at this very page. And let's say I forget about my own post and the replies thereof, and Astrella's reply to yours.


On the local level, the answer is "Be the DM".

we need more women making games for (tastes and desires of) women, and we need more female players playing and mingling with male players.

It's like being in a party with one "weak" sorceress and one "strong" fighter.

So basically your solution consists of the idea that for reducing sexism in gaming you basically have to reduce sexism in gaming which is basically true but not exactly helpful.
I maybe be mistaken, but all of these posts reference roleplaying explicitly.

So... yeah. Sorry, but your appeal looks like an attempt at silencing feminist discourse.

[Poison_Fish]

I wouldn't consider that to be a universally advantageous position.

No one has said it was a "universally advantageous position". Pretty much everyone here who's been talking about the problems of sexism has also stated, in more or less words, that traditional gender roles hurts everyone. Why so many of the people questioning this can't see beyond black and white is beyond me. If you want to get into the nitty gritty of power dynamics we can. The general consensus there is that men are favored hierarchically. Favored does not mean golden child. Note, it is far more complex then what I am saying here, but it's not black and white.

[Werekat]

FrozenFeet, presumably the society in which you were speaking of the cultural violence of men against men. These mechanisms work similarly across the world.

[Black Jester]

(Scrubbed)


After my post was just considered flaming: Sorry, I seriously did not intend to offend anyone. If i have given offense, I am sorry; that wasn't the idea.

[JusticeZero]

You're right; it isn't black and white. Adding the concern about sexism against males and objectification of men as power objects adds nuance. Sometimes it is harshly rebuffed in frustrating ways.
Maybe i'm strange in that my tables tend to be pretty egalitarian in setting. I can comment that simply dictating egalitarianism onto a setting with no other thought behind it feels forced and a bit strange in places - not because I want "traditional" gender roles to be enforced, but because it feels like a number of socioeconomic issues are swept under the rug. That's why I folded a cultural gender role difference back into my setting, even though I think it's pretty darned pro-feminist of a gender role.

[AMFV]

That said, I take issue at this bit:This isn't actually the case. It is normally true, but it is not true because it is a fact, it is true because it is a self-fulfilling prophecy. Society tells a girl "Girls are weak", and in return, she avoids doing the things that would make her physically strong. In reality, strength and physical fitness by body size is starting to look kind've equal given a woman who was taught from a young age to push her body hard to build strength in the ways that men are often socialized to.

It is exactly actually the case, 100%. Women are biologically less equipped for strength than main. And by implying that by "trying harder" they could be the equals of men you have just implied that every single female athlete, every single one doesn't push herself as hard as she could have, and that is an offensive statement.

You can't ignore biological differences in an argument about sexism, since its more important to look at how people are treated, but pretending those differences don't exist is like going to an argument about racism and claiming that "Well the black people aren't really all that dark", you can't simply ignore things that are the case. Women are physically less capable then men for most strength related activities, they have less dense bone structure, they have higher body fat percentage. I was in the Marines I've worked with extremely motivated and competent women, and I've never met one that could compete physically on the same level as a man. They could certainly reach the required level of competency, to be a Marine, but they couldn't pick up and carry as much, or go for as long as a man could.

This is one area where roleplaying games can be vastly less sexist you can produce a reality where men and women are physically equal, in fact D&D actually does this, which is a huge step in the right direction, regardless of art or bad writing, that is an enormous step in the right direction.

[AMFV]

No one has said it was a "universally advantageous position". Pretty much everyone here who's been talking about the problems of sexism has also stated, in more or less words, that traditional gender roles hurts everyone. Why so many of the people questioning this can't see beyond black and white is beyond me. If you want to get into the nitty gritty of power dynamics we can. The general consensus there is that men are favored hierarchically. Favored does not mean golden child. Note, it is far more complex then what I am saying here, but it's not black and white.

I concur. My mother for example has chosen to take on traditional gender roles, she is a housewife and has been mostly a housewife and a mother. She's happier than she's been when she's working. My father is happier than when we had an extra income because she is happier. I would say that's a clear case of traditional gender roles helping to improve in general the lives of those participating.

[Astrella]

I concur. My mother for example has chosen to take on traditional gender roles, she is a housewife and has been mostly a housewife and a mother. She's happier than she's been when she's working. My father is happier than when we had an extra income because she is happier. I would say that's a clear case of traditional gender roles helping to improve in general the lives of those participating.

It's not though, it's just people making choices that they feel best about. Gender roles policy and limit what people can do. Gender roles are restrictions. Getting rid of restrictions doesn't prevent people from doing anything.

[Merellis]

It's not though, it's just people making choices that they feel best about. Gender roles policy and limit what people can do. Gender roles are restrictions. Getting rid of restrictions doesn't prevent people from doing anything.

Pretty much this, and darn, people are either beating me in posting speed or knocking my posts out of the water with awesome.

Curse you again for that Serpentiiiiiiine~! :smallbiggrin:

[Irenaeus]

Society tells a girl "Girls are weak", and in return, she avoids doing the things that would make her physically strong. In reality, strength and physical fitness by body size is starting to look kind've equal given a woman who was taught from a young age to push her body hard to build strength in the ways that men are often socialized to.
This is kind of a tangent, and not really important for the main discussion, but if you have one, I'd be interested in reading a source for that claim.

[AMFV]

It's not though, it's just people making choices that they feel best about. Gender roles policy and limit what people can do. Gender roles are restrictions. Getting rid of restrictions doesn't prevent people from doing anything.

Well the question is the ability to do whatever you want the best for a society? This is to complicated to answer here, but acting that the baseline assumption is that, when it may not necessarily be is something that should be looked at.

There are various things that I have been limited from doing in my life, and I don't think that it was terrible negative discrimination, for example I'm short, so I'll never be able to be a professional basketball player. Note, that while this is hyperbole, and I wouldn't equate traditional male gender roles to professional athletics. The point is that not being able to do whatever you want is not necessarily a position based completely on discrimination.

[Water_Bear]

So... yeah. Sorry, but [Kalmageddon's] appeal looks like an attempt at silencing feminist discourse.

If I go to my local pool hall and start going off on my Freudian interpretation of the symbolism of billiards, causing such a stink that no-one can play or talk about pool there for days without it inevitably turning back to debates about phallic imagery and the anal retentive phase, silencing me is the most reasonable course of action available.

Now that's not to say that there isn't a lot of questionably psychosexual imagery in billiards; all those balls and the constant grasping and polishing of cues, you can sort of see it from the Freudian view if you squint and look at it from an angle. And maybe you might want to have a chat like that later with your buddies in a more private setting. But it does not then hold that therefore it's appropriate to get up on the table and start delivering monologues about how everyone who breaks on the left needs to see an analyst about their obvious mother issues.

[Coidzor]

I concur. My mother for example has chosen to take on traditional gender roles, she is a housewife and has been mostly a housewife and a mother. She's happier than she's been when she's working. My father is happier than when we had an extra income because she is happier. I would say that's a clear case of traditional gender roles helping to improve in general the lives of those participating.

That depends, did your parents shame, humiliate, and otherwise censure you if you expressed an interest in things they thought were coded for the gender you aren't when you were growing up? Because that's an important and integral part of traditional gender roles, making sure that no one steps outside of them or "they get what's coming."


The point is that not being able to do whatever you want is not necessarily a position based completely on discrimination.

Being told you can't because you're a boy or girl and then being punished for having an interest that's deemed inappropriate for one's gender though...

[Emmerask]

That "obsession" exists because this forum has some pretty major problems with sexism.

It does?
To me it always felt as if everyone was fairly respectful to everyone else on these forums... else I would have been long gone.

[Astrella]

Well the question is the ability to do whatever you want the best for a society? This is to complicated to answer here, but acting that the baseline assumption is that, when it may not necessarily be is something that should be looked at.

There are various things that I have been limited from doing in my life, and I don't think that it was terrible negative discrimination, for example I'm short, so I'll never be able to be a professional basketball player. Note, that while this is hyperbole, and I wouldn't equate traditional male gender roles to professional athletics. The point is that not being able to do whatever you want is not necessarily a position based completely on discrimination.

There's a huge difference between not being able to do something because of your own ability and because of society telling you that you can't do it.

The analogy isn't really relevant because in the case of gender roles it very clearly is discrimination.

[Amphetryon]

That depends, did your parents shame, humiliate, and otherwise censure you if you expressed an interest in things they thought were coded for the gender you aren't when you were growing up? Because that's an important and integral part of traditional gender roles, making sure that no one steps outside of them or "they get what's coming."

Do you mean the gender, or the sex? The former is what the person identifies as, the sex is determined by which set of reproductive organs are present (which get extra complicated with hermaphrodites); they are often - but not always - the same, as evidenced by the forumites here who identify as transgendered.

[Coidzor]

Do you mean the gender, or the sex? The former is what the person identifies as, the sex is determined by which set of reproductive organs are present (which get extra complicated with hermaphrodites); they are often - but not always - the same, as evidenced by the forumites here who identify as transgendered.

Well, we could go into the horror of traditional gender roles as they're applied to transgender children, but I was specifically speaking from the perspective of an AFAB child expressing interest in male-coded things or an AMAB child expressing interest in female-coded things and the designated steps to curb that as necessitated by cleaving to "traditional gender roles."

[Oko and Qailee]

That said, I take issue at this bit:This isn't actually the case. It is normally true, but it is not true because it is a fact, it is true because it is a self-fulfilling prophecy. Society tells a girl "Girls are weak", and in return, she avoids doing the things that would make her physically strong. In reality, strength and physical fitness by body size is starting to look kind've equal given a woman who was taught from a young age to push her body hard to build strength in the ways that men are often socialized to.

Im sorry, but no.

It is a biological FACT that for the same amount of effort men develop muscle mass more easily than women, this is a FACT. It is not sexism, it is not "society", it is genetics. Ignoring reality just because you want to find another issue to add to the "this is sexist" list is wrong.

Before you say "some women are just as strong as men", yes some are, thats because not everyone is average and some women genetically have rare traits that allow them to be stronger than some men.

But men being stronger than women (assuming equal amounts of effort being out into physical fitness) is a fact. In contrast, women have better balance and can withstand more pain (genetic advantage because childbirth is painful).

Don't ignore reality just because society isn't perfect. Stop thinking that the only differences between people are cultural, that's wrong and incorrect and to think so is to be willfully ignorant.

[Astrella]

Do you mean the gender, or the sex? The former is what the person identifies as, the sex is determined by which set of reproductive organs are present (which get extra complicated with hermaphrodites); they are often - but not always - the same, as evidenced by the forumites here who identify as transgendered.

Sex is way more complicated than just genitals; it's hormone levels, chromosomes, secondary sex characteristics, genitals, body shape, etc...

(Also hermaphrodites is a sorta outdated term, you're looking for "intersex people")

[Amphetryon]

Sex is way more complicated than just genitals; it's hormone levels, chromosomes, secondary sex characteristics, genitals, body shape, etc...

(Also hermaphrodites is a sorta outdated term, you're looking for "intersex people")

Last time I took a college class on the issue, Clinton wasn't yet President; please forgive my use of outdated terminology. The preceding is not sarcasm.

[Astrella]

Last time I took a college class on the issue, Clinton wasn't yet President; please forgive my use of outdated terminology. The preceding is not sarcasm.

No worries, just thought I might clarify a bit.

[JusticeZero]

Muscle mass is not identical to strength. Men start out, on the average, larger, and can get even bigger through effort. The comparison is not between a huge bulky athlete who yes has obscene strength; it is with a small framed wiry athlete.

[AMFV]

Muscle mass is not identical to strength. Men start out, on the average, larger, and can get even bigger through effort. The comparison is not between a huge bulky athlete who yes has obscene strength; it is with a small framed wiry athlete.

Yet female athletes cannot compete directly with men, there are separate leagues for a reason. So are you implying that those female athletes don't try as hard as they could, because that is a pretty offensive statement.

[Mr Beer]

Muscle mass is not identical to strength.

They sure as hell correlate though.

[LibraryOgre]

The Mod Wonder: Thread Temporarily closed while I go through and do some modding. I would really suggest that everyone take a moment to reacquaint themselves with the rules (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/announcement.php?a=1) on Flaming/Trolling, and, especially, Hate Speech.

[LibraryOgre]

Thank you for providing an adequate summary.

This discussion shouldn't even be on the Roleplaying Games board, it doesn't have anything to do with roleplaying, rather it went in "discuss everything sexist" mode.
I'd kindly ask a mod to move it in a more appropriate section because it's disturbing to see the obsession this forum has when it comes to gender issues plastered in not one but two threads on a board that SHOULD be about roleplaying games.

The Mod Wonder: Specific answer here. As mentioned far, far above, the mods, admins and Rich have already discussed the placement of this; we agreed that it was appropriate for the RPG forum because it is about RPGs, even though it is necessarily veering into other areas. If you don't think it's appropriate for this area, take it up with Roland.

[LibraryOgre]

The Mod Wonder: Going to reopen the thread. With some obvious exceptions, I think folks have been doing a fairly good job of staying on topic and expressing differing views without flaming. There have been some exceptions, and I've sent out at least 10 warnings or infractions, and there's a lot more than got scrubbed but not thumped because they'd already been thumped in the thread.

As I said above, mind your Ps and Qs.. It's ok to disagree, but not to flame. Approach the post, not attack the poster. Ignore folks you feel are being obvious trolls.

[The Oni]

Anyway, I for one figure that the best way to deal with this is...probably to invert the parts that are benign and do away with the rest. You want your fantasy warrior women to look extra-sexy? OK, you can have that, but do the same for the men in the same roles. If the sorceress looks like a runway model and dresses like Prestidigitation is the only thing holding her robes up, dress the sorcerer the same way.

[LibraryOgre]

I'll address some of your other points in private.



First things first: I wholeheartedly agree with your overall point. The frequent and impractical lack of clothing/armor on female fantasy characters is concerning. BUT, there can be wrong arguments in favour of true statements. The barbarian image you cite here is one such example.

Look at Conan. Look at the cover of Masters of the Wild where the iconic 3.X barbarian amazingly exposes chest and legs in subzero temperatures. Look at the Diablo II barbarian who shows much more skin (http://majorslack.com/pics/screenshots/diablo_01.jpg) than any of the other classes, three of them female. Or maybe just put 'barbarian' in the google image search and see how many depictions have exposed chests. It is easily the majority.

So, this barbarian doesn't wear little armor because she is female. This barbarian wears little armor because she is a barbarian.

An interesting viewpoint, but one I'm not sure I agree with. While you point to the cover of Masters of the Wild, I'd point to the iconic image from the 3.5 book...

http://cdn.obsidianportal.com/images/597401/marshal_krusk.jpg

A Krusk who is half-dressed... but that's because he's wearing shorts and short sleeves. There is a significant body of work with barbarians being half-naked, and I'm certainly not going to argue that, but as my reference to the Shortpacked comic showed, those representations are not necessarily equal... the men are powerfully muscled, sometimes attractively scarred, whereas the women tend to be lithe and scarless... even if they are utterly uncovered in places people like to put knives, and swinging weapons larger than themselves.

If you look at bard iconics from 3.x and Pathfinder (Gimble, Devis and Lem, all are male... but none is shirtless, or even remotely scantily clad, despite only Devis wearing what might be considered armor (and Devis was the iconic in 3.0, where bards ran into efficiency problems if they wore armor; Gimble and Lem don't suffer from this).

So, while there may be an element of "uncovered because she's a barbarian", that's not the only issue at work.

[Lamech]

whereas the women tend to be lithe and scarless... even if they are utterly uncovered in places people like to put knives, and swinging weapons larger than themselves.Erm... Amiri has a good number of scars. Nor does she strike me as particularly lithe. (Although that might just be the heavy armor.)

[Drakyn]

Erm... Amiri has a good number of scars. Nor does she strike me as particularly lithe. (Although that might just be the heavy armor.)
http://www.personal.psu.edu/users/m/i/mib5566/final/finalpics/barb.png
This is one of the first three images that appears under "Amiri pathfinder" in GIS (well, a resized version of it) and to my knowledge it is official art. A careful compare-and-contrast with Mark Hall's Krusk picture shows that:
-Unlike Krusk, Amiri's clothing deficiencies are designed for titillation rather than to show off bulging muscles and physical prowess - she has sideboob, underboob, gaps in her pants over her thighs and around her waist, and a bared middrift (utterly uncovered in places people like to put knives...check)
-Unlike Krusk, Amiri is very slightly built, with almost all of her mass coming from the selected parts of her armor that weren't designed to titillate. She has none of his Schwarzeneggeresque muscles despite carrying around a weapon as oversized as his (tend to be lithe... and swinging weapons larger than themselves.... double-check).
-Unlike Krusk, Amiri's scars are minor and do not disfigure her in any significant way. (tend to be scarless.... we'll call that one halfsies).

Now, if she and Krusk really were designed from the same principle list of barbarian archetypes, she'd have to be:
-About triple her current weight, mostly in raw muscle, and with the broad shoulders of an exaggerated 'heroic build' rather than supermodel-slim.
-Wearing at minimum the leather-armour-or-better equivalent of a full-torso tank top and long shorts, with no randomly removed bits.
-Looking like someone had tried to turn her face into a Jack O'Lantern and only gotten halfway before she managed to gnaw off their hand. And it wouldn't have been a very pretty face to start with.
As it is, she's just a great example of Mark Hall's list of Barbarian Double Standards (TM).

[Frozen_Feet]

@Black Jester: I know my solution sounds circular, but that's because the issue itself is caused by a positive feedback loop. I discussed this earlier in the thread: sexism drives away female players, causing the hobby to male dominated, allowing for men to be sexist without being called on it by women, driving away female players...

Wrong stereotypes persist because those who hold them have no regular touch with subject of those stereotypes. If decrease in sexism isn't accompanied by a mass influx of new female players, the sexism will eventually reinstate itself. At worst, we just end up trading one set of faulty stereotypes for another.

@Werekat: I partially concede the point. Upon closer look, you are talking of essentialism, and how it leads to the No True Scotsman fallacy, and social implications of that. As essentialism is one of default modes of human thinking, you are right to say it exist pretty much everywhere.

But what is considered essential to being a member of any gender, and what societal conclusions are drawn from that, vary. Take, for example, these forums. Is it possible for an invidual poster to espouse essentialist views? Yes. But if that poster's viewpoint is invalid, he will be called out on it by other members of this forum; and if the poster uses his essentialist viewpoint as an excuse to make ad hominem assaults against posters that fail to meet his standards, he will be excised from this community. So, as an institution, this forum, this society, is against the sort of behaviour you describe.

Sadly, not all forums are that good about this.

@JusticeZero: I agree that the issue of women being physically weaker is also a result of a feedback loop. Good catch. But it is biology that gets this ball rolling. Pound-for-pound, men are stronger, so between equally trained persons who are of same size and weight, a man has advantage over a woman. In absolute terms, the difference is not huge, but it adds up.

But again, I agree it causes a loop of negative expectations. Because men are stronger, they get identified with strength, and by contrast women get indentified with weakness... causing the exact unfortunate event you describe.

@TerraOblivion: I can't for the life of me understand why you consider lack of empathy unrelated to viewpoints of male expendability. They are interlinked - lack of empathy causes people to view others as expendable, and vice versa. (Another feedback loop, it seems.) Best studies on this have little to do with gender, though; they are instead based on study of anti-social inviduals.

Other than that, I agree with your concerns of lack of empathy and what it causes.

[The Oni]

Looking like someone had tried to turn her face into a Jack O'Lantern and only gotten halfway before she managed to gnaw off their hand. And it wouldn't have been a very pretty face to start with.

I dunno about the last bit; just because the average player's Barbarian typically ends up using Charisma as a dump stat doesn't mean she couldn't have a certain...untamed charm? And I don't think wounds leave scars when you use Cure Light Wounds.

But I agree that it's an awfully proud Barbarian that can't be bothered with a hardened leather chestpiece. Maybe she's DEX-based?

[Serpentine]

I dunno about the last bit; just because the average player's Barbarian typically ends up using Charisma as a dump stat doesn't mean she couldn't have a certain...untamed charm? And I don't think wounds leave scars when you use Cure Light Wounds.

But I agree that it's an awfully proud Barbarian that can't be bothered with a hardened leather chestpiece. Maybe she's DEX-based?If you need to go out of your way to come up with unillustrated explanations to justify why a female is dressed the way she is in a manner that you do not feel the need to do for male figures, then you have a problem with the way women are depicted.

Anyone who doesn't think women are depicted differently to any meaningful degree in fantasy, and specifically gaming, art: I challenge you to go out, grab a book, and compare ALL of the images side by side. Not just the cherry picked ones that "prove" your point - that is, not just the exceptions - but all of them. And then come tell us that female characters aren't far more likely than male ones to be depicted with silly, useless, revealing clothing, in contorted poses and with a far lesser range of body types represented.
If you manage to find a book for which you can genuinely say that, great! I'd love to check that game out! Now go find five of them. Or if you're really determined, take a random selection of, say, a hundred books from a variety of game systems, and see if more than - let's be generous - 10% can truthfully have this said about them.

Note that I'm not saying that you can't ever have scantily-clad, titillating fantasy art. I love a lot of stuff like that, myself, and there's plenty of characters for which it makes sense. But it's the proportions that matter, the fact that you have to go out of your way to find the sort of art that is standard when it comes to male characters.

I really should do my analysis of League of Legends body types some time...

[The Oni]

I was kidding, and DEX-based barbarians don't really work that well. Especially not with greatswords. Girl really needs to put some nice solid leather or metal between her and the direboars.

I like scantily clad fantasy females, when they're depicted realistically. I see no reason a sorceress with CHA through the roof wouldn't walk around flaunting it (albeit in sensible shoes, I think). And I also see no reason why a scantily clad barbarian lady wouldn't...quickly die in a puddle of her own blood.

[Serpentine]

Alright. My point still stands generally, though - there are people who make such arguments in earnest. Already have upthread, in fact...

[LibraryOgre]

I dunno about the last bit; just because the average player's Barbarian typically ends up using Charisma as a dump stat doesn't mean she couldn't have a certain...untamed charm? And I don't think wounds leave scars when you use Cure Light Wounds.

But I agree that it's an awfully proud Barbarian that can't be bothered with a hardened leather chestpiece. Maybe she's DEX-based?

Sure, possibly... but it doesn't change the fact that the two depictions are hardly equal. "Scars don't leave wounds when you use magic" could equally apply to male barbarians, and "Charisma is a dump stat" and "maybe she has a high Dex" doesn't change that her picture is presents her as a nice-appearing object, wearing impractical clothing for her chosen profession, but the male counterpart does not.

Someone mentioned the Pathfinder Paladin and Cleric.

Cleric: http://www.pathfindercommunity.net/iconic-characters/kyra---iconic-cleric

Paladin: http://www.pathfindercommunity.net/iconic-characters/seelah---iconic-paladin

Both ARE a lot better. They have some odd art issues (overly ornate armor on seelah, weird armor medallions on Kyra), but neither is tied to them being objects so much as the art style.

In fact, since Pathfinder images are easy to find, and largely of the same artistic style, let's take a look at their iconics for this purpose. Here's a link (http://www.pathfindercommunity.net/iconic-characters) to the section I'll be using; there's certainly other art of the iconics, but this is freely available to look at.

There are 14 iconic characters (excluding Dorn, the Saint, from a non-Paizo source). Of those, 8 present as women, compared to 6 presenting as men. Good representation. However, let's look at the art.

Women
Alahazra, Oracle: (http://www.pathfindercommunity.net/iconic-characters/alhazara---iconic-oracle) She's a spellcaster from a Charisma-based class that's also proficient with light and medium armor. She's wearing a bustier, with an open robe over it, and a long skirt that leaves one leg uncovered. All appears to be cloth.

Amiri, Barbarian: (http://www.pathfindercommunity.net/iconic-characters/amiri---iconic-barbarian) She's a melee warrior from a light/medium armor focused class. She is wearing arm and leg armor similar to what you see in heavy armor illustrations, but with a bared midriff and no significant midsection armor.

Feiya, Witch: (http://www.pathfindercommunity.net/iconic-characters/feiya---iconic-witch) She's a spellcaster from an intelligence-based class that is proficient in no armor. No class features rely on Charisma (at least, not to a quick Ctrl+F of the page), but she's wearing an off-the-shoulder peasant top, showing ample cleavage, along with a corset, knee-high leather boots, and thigh-high stockings.

Kyra, Cleric: (http://www.pathfindercommunity.net/iconic-characters/kyra---iconic-cleric) She's a cleric, meaning she's from a Wisdom-based spellcasting class with a significant class feature based on Charisma (channel energy). Her class enables light and medium armor. She is wearing a shoulder to floor robe with hints of armor beneath. The only bare skin is at one elbow and her face.

Lini, Druid: (http://www.pathfindercommunity.net/iconic-characters/lini---iconic-druid) She's a druid, able to wear light or medium armor. Her class is Wisdom based, with a relatively minor Charisma-based ability (wild empathy). She's dressed in an ornate leather armor, leaving her upper arms and thighs bare, with a skirt or sarong failing to cover the thighs.

Merisiel, Rogue: (http://www.pathfindercommunity.net/iconic-characters/merisiel---iconic-rogue)Rogues have a role that is hard to pin down, so she may draw upon a high charisma as a face, but likely uses a high Dexterity and Intelligence as part of her attribute focuses. Merisiel is proficient in light armor, and her apparently leather armor covers everything but a cleavage window and her underarms.

Seelah, Paladin: (http://www.pathfindercommunity.net/iconic-characters/seelah---iconic-paladin) Seelah is from a heavy armor wearing, primarily melee class with a heavy emphasis on Charisma. She is wearing very ornate armor, carrying a helmet, and shows no skin except her face. There are a number of issues with her armor, but they're not related to her presentation as a woman.

Seoni, Sorcerer: (http://www.pathfindercommunity.net/iconic-characters/seoni---iconic-sorcerer) Seoni is a spellcaster from a no-armor, Charisma-based class. She is wearing a robe or dress that is cut up to her hips, leaving an ample cleavage window and bare shoulders, along with what appear to be bellbottom boots that run from calf to the ground and bellbottom gloves from elbow to fingers. Interestingly, she is wearing midriff protection of an undefined nature.

Men
Damiel, Alchemist: (http://www.pathfindercommunity.net/iconic-characters/damiel---iconic-alchemist) Damiel is a pseudo-spellcaster from an Intelligence-based class with proficiency in light armor. He is wearing what appears to be a leather robe, covering him from shoulder to floor, leaving only fingers and face visible.

Ezren, Wizard: (http://www.pathfindercommunity.net/iconic-characters/ezren---iconic-wizard) Ezren is a spellcaster of an Intelligence-based tradition with no armor proficiency. He is wearing a robe and pants combination, leaving only his forearms and face bare.

Harsk, Ranger: (http://www.pathfindercommunity.net/iconic-characters/harsk---iconic-ranger) Harsk is a warrior from a class with only a minor Charisma-based class feature (wild empathy), and proficiency in light armor. He is fully covered by leather armor, pants, and a gloves; only his face is uncovered.

Lem, Bard: (http://www.pathfindercommunity.net/iconic-characters/lem---iconic-bard) Lem is a spellcaster from a Charisma-based tradition with proficiency in light armor. Dressed in a pants-and-shirt combo with a mantle over his shoulders, his feet (as a halfling), fingers, and face are bare, though he also has his shirt open to expose his chest. He does not appear to be wearing any armor, though he does seem to have a broad leather girdle on underneath some of his accountrements.

Sajan, Monk: (http://www.pathfindercommunity.net/iconic-characters/sajan---iconic-monk) Sajan is a warrior from a class that specifically eschews armor in favor of Dexterity and Wisdom. While wearing sleeves, a sarong, and pants, his chest and face are completely bare.

Valeros, Fighter: (http://www.pathfindercommunity.net/iconic-characters/valeros---iconic-fighter) Valeros is an apparently melee-based warrior wearing semi-ornate armor that covers all of him except his face and parts of his arms, near the elbow.

Now, I'm gonna have to go to bed really quick, but I think that the three most interesting characters here (for the purposes of this conversation) are Alahazra, Feiya, and Amiri. Alahazra is dressed very provocatively, with no sign of the armor her class entitles her to, or that, indeed, her character sheet has her wearing. Feiya has a slight bonus to Charisma (13, +1), but is dressed in a revealing fashion and described as "socially awkward". Amiri, incidentally, is given an 18 Strength, a 13 Dex, and a 10 Charisma but is, as I said, built rather slightly, with ostensibly hide armor that does not cover her torso or upper thighs.

Only two of the 6 men bare much skin; Sajan is oddly clothed, but has a bare torso, while Lem is more dressed, though with a partially bared chest (a "cleavage window", had he anything resembling cleavage). The others are entirely covered. Of the women, 4 of the 8 bare a lot of skin (Alahazra, Amiri, Feiya, and Seoni), and only 2 are fully covered (Kyra and Seelah). The other 2 (Lini and Merisiel) are mostly covered, though Merisiel has "sexy" gaps in her armor, while Lini is quite close to be fully covered.

[Serpentine]

I'll be honest, I really dislike that art style anyway :I
(I think the monsters in it are alright, but the people all look elbowless, chunky and have weird little red noses)

[The Oni]

There's nothing about Feiya there that would be a hindrance to her doing her job. Exposed cleavage isn't going to leave her any more vulnerable than cloth to most stuff, and that's all she can wear anyway. I'd say this is a solid adventuing outfit for her, with lots of storage space for her spell components and wands. No problems here.

Alhazra...I would argue she actually IS saved by her character sheet, which explicitly mentions she avoids being in frontline combat, and she's statted for that sort of build. If she were, say, a Battle or Metal oracle? No, walking around like that would be dumb as all hell, but her Mystery is Flame. She's definitely artillery, not infantry, so I'd say...she's being vain, but not overtly stupid.

Amiri has got no excuse. Seriously, she ought to just wear a sign that says "Sneak Attack For 5d6" and call it a day.

[Lorsa]

This is magical thinking. (Reading the above books would help understand what I mean by this.) Every group of people is made from inviduals who engage in behaviours, and pretty much all forms of discrimination are based on restricting those inviduals from certain behaviours.

It is possible to discriminate against a group for no reason, based on no action, and that kind of baseless discrimination I agree is bad. But that is neither only or most common form of discrimination.

While I personally would like to further explore some of your other arguments I believe that would derail the topic into "what is discrimination" which, while being a valuable discussion to have, should probably be held some place else.

In the end I do believe we are in almost agreement anyway over when it's bad and when it's not and I've already agreed that there could be acceptable forms of discrimination so it's a bit pointless to discuss further.

I just want to add that I'm a roleplayer, most of my life is based on magical thinking.

[Lorsa]

I'll be honest, I really dislike that art style anyway :I

Me too.


There's nothing about Feiya there that would be a hindrance to her doing her job. Exposed cleavage isn't going to leave her any more vulnerable than cloth to most stuff, and that's all she can wear anyway. I'd say this is a solid adventuing outfit for her, with lots of storage space for her spell components and wands. No problems here.

Alhazra...I would argue she actually IS saved by her character sheet, which explicitly mentions she avoids being in frontline combat, and she's statted for that sort of build. If she were, say, a Battle or Metal oracle? No, walking around like that would be dumb as all hell, but her Mystery is Flame. She's definitely artillery, not infantry, so I'd say...she's being vain, but not overtly stupid.

Amiri has got no excuse. Seriously, she ought to just wear a sign that says "Sneak Attack For 5d6" and call it a day.

Just because it's not a hindrance to your job doesn't mean you automatically dress sexy. Some women do, but I don't think it's anywhere near the proportions depicted in the art. Also, the males that are from classes where minimalistic dress wouldn't be a hindrance to their jobs are proportionally much more covered. Which is strange since there's lots of men that walk around with as little clothing as they can get away with.

[Themrys]

Only two of the 6 men bare much skin; Sajan is oddly clothed, but has a bare torso,

He's the only one of the males who comes close to looking sexy.
Compared to a barbarian in a loincloth, he'd still be the sexier one. Monks are not chaste in that setting, I guess? Or required to be humble about their appearance?



Edit: Apparently, clarification is required. I did not mean to say that barbarians in loincloths are unattractive. (I don't find any of the men depicted there attractive, as a matter of fact, the monk included.)
I meant to say that this is the only outfit that comes close to being the equivalent of cleavage in that it is obviously emphasizing his looks. I.e. the only one that could be said to be meant to be sexy.

[hamishspence]

@JusticeZero: I agree that the issue of women being physically weaker is also a result of a feedback loop. Good catch. But it is biology that gets this ball rolling. Pound-for-pound, men are stronger, so between equally trained persons who are of same size and weight, a man has advantage over a woman. In absolute terms, the difference is not huge, but it adds up.

I'd like to see exactly how big the difference is- is a female weightlifter with the same lifting capacity as a male one usually a lot heavier, or only a little bit heavier?

And given that D&D does not have any rules correlating personal weight and lifting capacity (so you can have a minimum height, minimum weight, Str 18 human without the rules preventing it) - does it really matter that characters may be a little lighter than would be expected for their Strength?

[Lorsa]

I'd like to see exactly how big the difference is- is a female weightlifter with the same lifting capacity as a male one usually a lot heavier, or only a little bit heavier?

By looking at the olympic weightlifting records (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_world_records_in_Olympic_weightlifting) one could get an idea of the difference which seems to be around 20 kg. Whether or not you consider that to be a lot heavier or a little heavier is up to you.

It's not really relevant for most roleplaying games though, as you pointed out.

[AMFV]

By looking at the olympic weightlifting records (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_world_records_in_Olympic_weightlifting) one could get an idea of the difference which seems to be around 20 kg. Whether or not you consider that to be a lot heavier or a little heavier is up to you.

It's not really relevant for most roleplaying games though, as you pointed out.

Olympic weightlifting is also not a great measure for raw strength since all of the lifts involved have more to do with momentum and proper swinging form than actual power type lifting. I mean it's certainly a difficult and challenging event but it is not a good measure of raw strength.

Also noteworthy is that men tend to have a much higher average weight which if you'll check the olympic lifting records and powerlifting records has a much more significant effect.

I mean I don't think that it should matter in game terms though. If I'm playing a guy that can create fire with his mind or turn into a dragon, I'm certainly not going to object to a lady who can lift far more than any human being possibly could, because it's fun, and getting to an argument over realism in any game tends to wind up with the game getting less fun for at least one person.

[Spiryt]

I'd like to see exactly how big the difference is- is a female weightlifter with the same lifting capacity as a male one usually a lot heavier, or only a little bit heavier?

And given that D&D does not have any rules correlating personal weight and lifting capacity (so you can have a minimum height, minimum weight, Str 18 human without the rules preventing it) - does it really matter that characters may be a little lighter than would be expected for their Strength?

Difference, is rather huge and it's true to pretty much any form of athletic ability.

After all, it's not like woman aren't performing worse in relatively 'non-strength' sports as well.


For sheer weight lifting, which is about rather simple numbers, at the end, you have interesting things like Sinclair coefficient, which is used to calculate 'points' earned for lifting given weight, based on lifters sex and weight.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinclair_Coefficientshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinclair_Coefficients


As far as the rest of Your post goes - yes, in most games, especially like D&D, all those things are far beyond disconnected from physical reality of our bodies.

That's one of the reasons why any particular 'realistic' rules, like sexual dimorphism will usually be only headache.

[Lorsa]

Olympic weightlifting is also not a great measure for raw strength since all of the lifts involved have more to do with momentum and proper swinging form than actual power type lifting. I mean it's certainly a difficult and challenging event but it is not a good measure of raw strength.

hamishspence asked for weightlifting differences in specific! I completely agree that it's not a great measure for raw strength.

[The Oni]

Just because it's not a hindrance to your job doesn't mean you automatically dress sexy. Some women do, but I don't think it's anywhere near the proportions depicted in the art. Also, the males that are from classes where minimalistic dress wouldn't be a hindrance to their jobs are proportionally much more covered. Which is strange since there's lots of men that walk around with as little clothing as they can get away with.

Well, it reflects real-world biases. Again, I'm in no way opposed to the idea of attractive people dressing to show that off. The fluff makes it pretty clear that Alhazra is aware of her 18 Charisma in some fashion. Would a male oracle dress similarly (according to Pathfinder art?) Probably not. SHOULD he? Why not; if he's not, it implies some reason he wouldn't that hearkens back to a parallel with our world - but is not explained (and that's bad design.)

Really. I'm trying to be objective here. :smallconfused: I keep feeling as though I must explain myself over and over but I'm NOT, not, not, not saying that the Pathfinder art is some model of egalitarianism. Just that it's not the Sports Illustrated chainmail bikini edition that people make it out to be.

[Werekat]

FrozenFeet: I am talking about that, but I'm also taking a stance on how essentialism in respect to gender should be treated in my opinion. And also making a claim on how power dynamics work, not necessarily with respect to gender issues, but in general.

What I am saying is that if you have, in one society and in close proximity and interaction, a group that has a monopoly on violence, even a social obligation to be violent, and a second group, which has a social taboo to be violent, you will have the members of the violent group decide what the non-violent group is, with the most aggressive members of the latter helping the former in this endeavor, going so far as to use violence against the second group to enforce their definition. I think it would be best if generally-educated people were aware that if they end up in the second, violent-less group for any reason, it will not help them if they are told they are protected: they are, essentially, not.

You are saying that being a man in the aforementioned situation opens you up to a whole world of hurt because of people picking fights. What I'm saying is that being a woman in that same situation also opens you up to a world of hurt because someone can unpredictably (and this is important; the rules change to suit your vis-a-vis) decide that you're not a member of that 'protected' group anymore and attack you. And that happens quite often, as it is bound to happen in the social circumstances described above. Naturally, this forum is part of the 'real life' with which you started, but it is not the only part, as shown by your experiences and mine. We could stand to make all of it a better place, though.

Re: Pathfinder costumes, specifically Feiya and her outfit doing its job. Seriously? Walking around a dungeon or a forest in something that leaves your thighs and breasts exposed? That's gonna be cold and that's gonna hurt. She doesn't even have endure elements on her spell list.

I also find hilarious that there's so little elbow protection anywhere, both on men and women, whereas covering the joints is pretty much both easily done with a lot of armor and essential.

[Cerlis]

Me too.



Just because it's not a hindrance to your job doesn't mean you automatically dress sexy. Some women do, but I don't think it's anywhere near the proportions depicted in the art. Also, the males that are from classes where minimalistic dress wouldn't be a hindrance to their jobs are proportionally much more covered. Which is strange since there's lots of men that walk around with as little clothing as they can get away with.

In most character depictions if a man wants to "drss sexy" for whatever reason, it usualyl means good looking cloths (that usually fully cover their body...to show off their figure) and a bar chest (which is less of a faux paus with men, since for Women the Chest area is treated largly as all a sex item, while for men it is mostly just the nipples, as pecs fall into the same category as any other muscle))

Basically if "She dresses that way for her own sense of style" is taken into account...It begs the question "Why are only women trying to show off their cleavage and other sexy parts all the time?"

I'd LOVE a male Barbarian Monk in ass-less chaps. But all the men are all covered up!

And anyone with a sense of fashion know that less is more! A form fitting dress is much better than...a scarf wrapped around your chest!


P.S.

When i clicked on this link i expected to find a less...cordial conversation.

[Blackjackg]

Is the flavor text on the linked Pathfinder pages official, or fanmade? Either way, can we talk about

A lithe young woman with stark white hair stares provocatively at you, silently daring you to advance and either provoke or caress her. Her fingernails are overlong and sharpened, and she carries a wooden staff with strange trinkets tied to it.
please?

[Themrys]

Is the flavor text on the linked Pathfinder pages official, or fanmade? Either way, can we talk about

please?

What is there to talk about in this?
I mean, it's ... I'd say, plain bad writing. Either she wants to be provoked so she can start a fight, or she wants to be caressed by a stranger, which would be ... strange.

Also, people who have to carry anything at all usually don't have overlong fingernails. Those get in the way. Overlong fingernails are the privilege of people who want to show off the fact that they don't have to work at all.

[Blackjackg]

I guess my request to talk about it was mostly rhetorical-- just a theatrical way to call attention to it-- sorry about that.

Yeah, the flavor text is really weird. Not only sexualizing in a way that is nowhere near the flavor text of the other characters, but blending sex with danger and malice in accordance with the profoundly sexist femme fatale stereotype.

[Frozen_Feet]

Werekat, I see where you're coming from, but it still fails the different society test. Here, the groups that have oligopoly on violence are not "men"; they are members of specific professions, which are partially composed of and ruled by women. The average man can't arbitrarily decide to break the double standard without repercussions.

Also, taken to it's logical conclusion, your point of how every educated person should be wary of being "protected" means every such person should strive to become a soldier or a cop, or at minimum learn martial arts and how to shoot. While I may agree in principle, in practice such distrust eventually gets in way of life.

[Themrys]

Yeah, the flavor text is really weird. Not only sexualizing in a way that is nowhere near the flavor text of the other characters, but blending sex with danger and malice in accordance with the profoundly sexist femme fatale stereotype.

I hate that stereotype with a passion. Of course, sex can be dangerous. There are sexually transmitted diseases. But for some reason, the femme fatale is never implied to have one or several of those diseases. (It might happen in some cases, when she's a prostitute. But this is not explicitly mentioned to be the source of her sexy dangerousness)

It is a lie that is told to women - the lie, that sexyness is power. Of course, this lie is also told to men, but I get the feeling that it's aimed at women: "What are you complaining about? You wield the power to make men want to have sex with you, isn't that awesome?"

[Blackjackg]

It is a lie that is told to women - the lie, that sexyness is power. Of course, this lie is also told to men, but I get the feeling that it's aimed at women: "What are you complaining about? You wield the power to make men want to have sex with you, isn't that awesome?"

Yeah, it's a lie that's been told to men and women within my own culture (pre-European, European and post-European North American) for literally millennia:
Men need sex, so women must exploit their ability to provide sex to gain power over men. The harm that this message has done to women over the centuries is incalculable, and the fact that it continues to appear in all forms of fiction including roleplaying games is inexcusable.

[Lamech]

{{scrubbed}}

[Topus]

Sure there's a component of sexism in typical fantasy depictions, but it works in both feminine and masculine way.
Barbarian depiction derives from classical greek and latin descriptions of barbarian populations. In Caesar's De Bello Gallico Celts are often depicted as bare chested to display their braveness contrasting with armored roman soldiers. Spartan wore very long hair as a symbol, though you could see it as a disadvantage in close combat.
Body has always served as a powerful media for messages, and iconography reflects this power. So if we refer to a fantasy setting that recalls the flavour of middle ages, and its iconography, it's obvious to find sexist issues, because it was a sexist society, with gender roles.
As for women wearing bikini chain mail it's a direct consequence of warfare being a prominently male activity in these settings, so a woman warrior has to be "feminized" to perceive her as a woman. In a sexist setting feminize means to make her sexually appealing for men. Women in this settings have different roles: mothers, caretaker and life givers (thus the typical female healer), temptresses (think of La belle dame sans merci) sexually dominating men, not by phisical strenght, but by luring and seducing them.
Typical iconography and typical literature derive from this setting and it's only in modern societies that we are changing or suppressing gender roles. Of course a fantasy society can be different from real old societies so it is welcomed a change in the settings that reflects modern society roles. But really i don't understand the clothing issues (besides the ridiculous bikini mail) when also in real life women dress differently from men. If think they have the right to imagine a heroine who is still feminine, as men usually depict their characters as badass masculine heroes.

[Themrys]

Really the only nice (not wrong-bad?) use of someone wanting to have sex with you is getting that person to have sex with you.

It's not only the only nice thing, it's the only thing you can really manipulate people into by using sex appeal.

The femme fatale steretoype itself is proof that sex appeal can't even trick people into thinking you're a nice person. And if people don't think you're a nice and trustworthy person, you won't be able to manipulate them at all.

[detritus]

Yes and no. The culture of warfare has changed with the rest of the world. War and militaries are always steeped in tradition and rituals, but what those rituals are varies.

While I know chivalry wasn't as gentlemanly as portrayed in romantic literature, neither was it as bad as total war. By the time cameras arrived on stage, several other groundbreaking innovations had already changed the nature of war.

Rules of war are often obeyed with surprising fidelity, due to fear of reprisal. You see, the sort of merciless slaughter you described usually happens only after someone breaks the rules. After that, the gloves come off. For an interesting study, consider chemical warfare in WW1, and its lack in WW2. Pretty much every nation had chemical weapons in store for WW2, but because people had decided they were too horrifying, no-one dared to use them on the battlefield out of fear of being subjected to them themselves. Also consider nuclear weapons and MAD.

There are many studies on how few soldiers actually shot to kill in World Wars. I doubt it was much different in past ages. Most soldiers were happy to just clash sabres and surrender, or flee, rather than fight to death. Even in contemporary military jargon, an unit is "defeated" after losing just 20% of its manpower; and destroyed after losing 50%. Majority of defeated forces have usually survived, and when they've been executed in the aftermath, it's been usually considered a warcrime.

One way to look at it is that while violence and subsequent death and crippling due to injuries, disease etc. were more common, actual deaths at battlefield were less so.


erm....not sure where you're getting these ideas from. If warfare was a civilised "sabre clashing" exercise, followed by surrender and changing sides for a bit of fun, nobody would ever have gone to war in the first place.
Wars are NOT fought to get rid of surplus population, they have always been fought to gain the leader of one faction or another some kind of territorial or economic gain. If your soldiers could not be relied upon to actually, you know, fight, what would be the point?

Many WW1 soldiers did initially shoot to miss, you are correct. However, seeing many of their friends machine gunned or shelled, plus the incessant propaganda, turned many of them into very efficient killers.
You're right in saying that in medieval times deaths due directly to battle were relatively few compared to disease famine etc, as a percentage of total deaths. Your logic in assuming that war and battle were therefore like sheep head butting each other for show is utterly flawed. Armies were small, the luxury of a large permanent army was centuries away. Battles were bloody, brutal and often fatal - Stamford bridge in 1066 resulted in around 7000 dead and wounded, Hastings around 5000 following a day-long battle

Modern units are considered destroyed after losing 50% of their manpower, but consider what that actually means - 50% of your combat troops, officers, supply, medical, support units. It's not like some board game where your units fight on until destroyed with apparently little effect other than rolling fewer dice of damage. To lose 50% of their TOTAL strength a unit would be essentially wrecked as a fighting force, which is of course the reason regiments were rotated out of combat and resupplied regularly in WW2 for example. German units which didn't have that luxury by 1944-5 were simply eradicated.

[The Oni]

Re: Pathfinder costumes, specifically Feiya and her outfit doing its job. Seriously? Walking around a dungeon or a forest in something that leaves your thighs and breasts exposed? That's gonna be cold and that's gonna hurt. She doesn't even have endure elements on her spell list.

I mean I get that, but by that logic why isn't everyone just wearing HAZMAT suits, yeah? There's no reason for Valeros, or any of the other fighters, to not be wearing full-helms, and cloth padding under their armor. And in a high-op game like that, all the negotiation buffs are gonna be got from magic or "Diplomancy," if they're got at all - no need for the murderhobos to dress sexy. Be honest with yourself; does this not sound like you're nitpicking, just a little?

[Scow2]

Sounds good in theory, but has its problems when it comes to the practical implementation. And I think one can so easily turn your suggestion upside down that it is basically... how should i put it? ... putting the cart before the horse.
If you want to include more women in gaming you need to establish a more inclusive environment. You want to attract a new group of players, you need to make sure that the group in question is welcomed. Real (or, if you insist perceived) sexism is an obstacle to this process of inclusion. So basically your solution consists of the idea that for reducing sexism in gaming you basically have to reduce sexism in gaming which is basically true but not exactly helpful.We need to reduce sexism in the gaming industry - there are plenty of female gamers - many of them unhappy with the status quo. What's lacking is the female designers, which requires changes on the corporate and social level (Equal pay, equal opportunity in hiring and marketing, and the like).


The problem with being expected to be powerful is that one is then obligated to be the one to use that power every time a situation arises that can be solved with power.
If a woman wants to be the one to take the powerful role, then, well - because culturally, men are treated as power objects, that's all they had going for them.
It's like being in a party with one "weak" sorceress and one "strong" fighter. If the sorceress decides to try her hand at being a gish, then well.. what does the fighter have? Maybe the fighter pushes back and tries to "put her in her place". Maybe the fighter just sort've fades away - "They won't get past me, save yourself!" In every case, problems are going to arise in the dynamic because "being strong" is the only thing that the guy had according to culture, and the sorceress just found out how to do that too. The solution is not to try to make sure that the guy can be strong. That was the problem in the first place. The solution is to help him branch out and become more complete. Maybe with Cleric levels so he can learn how to be a caring medic or something. ;)

Yep. "Oh, walk it off, you big baby." I'm sorry, but whatever happened hurt a lot. I know people who've been told that when they wanted to get injuries looked at. They included things like broken bones that never healed right because they weren't set.
But the cultural message is crystal clear. "You are powerful, you are sturdy, you can shrug off whatever damage comes your way, and when it comes time to decide who needs to be saved or helped, you are last in line if you get into the queue at all. All because you were born a man."
I wouldn't consider that to be a universally advantageous position.


No one has said it was a "universally advantageous position". Pretty much everyone here who's been talking about the problems of sexism has also stated, in more or less words, that traditional gender roles hurts everyone. Why so many of the people questioning this can't see beyond black and white is beyond me. If you want to get into the nitty gritty of power dynamics we can. The general consensus there is that men are favored hierarchically. Favored does not mean golden child. Note, it is far more complex then what I am saying here, but it's not black and white.Gender Roles are tradeoffs. Men are taught that empathy is weakness... because it interferes with self-reliance. On one hand, males are expected to put up with adversity and ultimately die young. In exchange, adversity builds character, and increases power and reputation. Everything someone who lives as Disposable earns is theirs, for themselves, those close to them, and their posterity. Many males (I don't know if it's a universal majority, but it is where I live) like this tradeoff, and see Feminism as a threat to what they've earned and what has been earned for them by those who came before - removing 'disposability' invalidates and struggle to get where we are, and taking that privilege away makes the past struggles worthless. Many women also want into this game. Others don't, but think they do. Many men want out of it... but to try to destroy that game entirely takes away from those who want to live by it, for better or worse.

I'm not as familiar with the 'game' females play - it's superficially similar, but there are differences. A lot more women are unhappy with this s

Social Justice Feminism wants to do away with the 'games' entirely, while ignoring that many people, men and women alike, prefer them for better or worse, and demonize and dismiss any opinion supporting the game: Men are dismissed as supporting it because they're the "winners", and women who enjoy it are treated as incapable of seeing the damage they're doing to themselves (Damage as defined by the feminists) and in need of re-education to conform to the viewpoint of those who 'know what's best for them".


It's not though, it's just people making choices that they feel best about. Gender roles policy and limit what people can do. Gender roles are restrictions. Getting rid of restrictions doesn't prevent people from doing anything.Gender roles are as much guidelines as well. If significantly more men take up some responsibilities than women, and more women take up different responsibilities from men, that's not really a problem. The problem is when individual men and women are prevented and significantly penalized for going outside those roles.


I hate that stereotype with a passion. Of course, sex can be dangerous. There are sexually transmitted diseases. But for some reason, the femme fatale is never implied to have one or several of those diseases. (It might happen in some cases, when she's a prostitute. But this is not explicitly mentioned to be the source of her sexy dangerousness)

It is a lie that is told to women - the lie, that sexyness is power. Of course, this lie is also told to men, but I get the feeling that it's aimed at women: "What are you complaining about? You wield the power to make men want to have sex with you, isn't that awesome?"I'm still trying to figure out how much of it's a lie and how much is truth... You say it's lie, but everything I've seen and experienced first-hand, and have heard second-and-third hand contradict the assertion that it's a lie. It IS an oversimplification, though. It's up there with "Intimidation and torture never get results" - which, while the opposite is not true (Intimidation and torture always get results), it DOES work often enough to be disturbing.

It kinda reminds me of the scene in 1984:
O'Brien held up his left hand, its back toward Winston, with the
thumb hidden and the four fingers extended.
"How many fingers am I holding up, Winston?"
"Four."Maybe the world and society would be better if five fingers were being held up. We certainly don't know what four fingers mean... but it doesn't change that only four are held up. Maybe there's a fifth one held up somewhere else out of sight, but it doesn't change the fact that only four are visible. Maybe five are held up by some people somewhere... but only four are being held up here.

[detritus]

I hate that stereotype with a passion. Of course, sex can be dangerous. There are sexually transmitted diseases. But for some reason, the femme fatale is never implied to have one or several of those diseases. (It might happen in some cases, when she's a prostitute. But this is not explicitly mentioned to be the source of her sexy dangerousness)

It is a lie that is told to women - the lie, that sexyness is power. Of course, this lie is also told to men, but I get the feeling that it's aimed at women: "What are you complaining about? You wield the power to make men want to have sex with you, isn't that awesome?"

Why confuse the stereotype of a femme fatale with a prostitute?
A femme fatale uses her sexuality as a device to manipulate men around her to achieve her goals, whether they be acquiring information, power, money, whatever. She may not even actually have sex with them. Nowhere in literature or popular culture does anyone equate the old fashioned idea of a femme fatale with a woman forced into selling her body.
Risking howls of "misogyny!" women can and do use sexiness as power every day. Look at the number of rich and powerful men with young, attractive and yes, sexy, girfriends/wives. Men are by and large idiots when it comes to women, a woman who acts and looks the part that fits his stereotype, if you like, can easily manipulate him. Yes, it's sexist, it's just that in this case the man is exploited.

[crayzz]

You say it's lie, but everything I've seen and experienced first-hand, and have heard second-and-third hand contradict the assertion that it's a lie.

I doubt the totally of your observations of sexual interactions between genders show women manipulating men with sex.

As for me, I've yet to see a woman manipulate a man with sex; I do know several men who argued that "men need sex; it's just how we are" and therefor "you need to have sex with me."

On that note, what universe do you live in where women are free to express their sexuality? The one I live in has an overwhelming tendency to label such women as "sluts." Saying that "sex is power" for women ignores the fact that women are regularly demonized for acting sexually.


Look at the number of rich and powerful men with young, attractive and yes, sexy, girfriends/wives. Men are by and large idiots when it comes to women, a woman who acts and looks the part that fits his stereotype, if you like, can easily manipulate him.

Which way is the power working? Is she using her sexuality to attract him, or is he using the promise of financial wealth to attract her?

This is also a tiny portion of the population; saying that because "women can just get a rich husband," women can be powerful with sex is ridiculous. Some women might be able to; it is not true for most women, and it does little to address the power imbalance.

EDIT: for clarity, it's about as ridiculous as saying that women just want money, so a rich man can manipulate women, and thus men have "power." It simply does not hold true in general, even if it might hold true in specific instances.

[The Oni]

Sexiness is an illusion of power, and if politics has taught us anything, it's that the illusion of power IS power. A prostitute acquires money but she is short-sighted; in fantasy settings, as in real life, a woman given sufficient brains, looks and ambition can travel in the circles of power very quickly. In some cases they maneuver into true ruling positions - see: Empress Dowager Ci Xi. Start as concubine, acquire kingdom. Not bad, really.

[Themrys]

Why confuse the stereotype of a femme fatale with a prostitute?
A femme fatale uses her sexuality as a device to manipulate men around her to achieve her goals, whether they be acquiring information, power, money, whatever.

Oh, be assured, I don't confuse the two. Prostitutes are real.

Femme fatales, on the other hand, are a myth.

A woman may be a successful spy by looking like a stupid bimbo, but that's not using her sexyness as such, that's using disguise. Disguising as some other kind of person who is not taken seriously would work just as well.

The beautiful women married to rich, not very handsome men? Are either, for some reason or other, truly in love with those men, or prostitutes by an other name.

[Hyena]

Well, there was Mata Hari. She wasn't a traditional femme fatale, but she fits the description surprisingly well.

[AMFV]

Oh, be assured, I don't confuse the two. Prostitutes are real.

Femme fatales, on the other hand, are a myth.

A woman may be a successful spy by looking like a stupid bimbo, but that's not using her sexyness as such, that's using disguise. Disguising as some other kind of person who is not taken seriously would work just as well.

The beautiful women married to rich, not very handsome men? Are either, for some reason or other, truly in love with those men, or prostitutes by an other name.

Well there certainly have been honeypot type spy things in the real world, so there are real femme fatales. Who have used that methodology to extract information. Obviously there are ethical questions involved, but it certainly exists. It's a legitimate a tactic in intelligence as using money or blackmail.

[Terraoblivion]

Sexiness is an illusion of power, and if politics has taught us anything, it's that the illusion of power IS power. A prostitute acquires money but she is short-sighted; in fantasy settings, as in real life, a woman given sufficient brains, looks and ambition can travel in the circles of power very quickly. In some cases they maneuver into true ruling positions - see: Empress Dowager Ci Xi. Start as concubine, acquire kingdom. Not bad, really.

She didn't use sexiness for that, though. She became a concubine due to her family's prestigious position, then she built her power through ruthless skill at court intrigue. Nothing I've read about the matter, which is quite a bit given that the history of China during the late Qing and Republican period are among my primary fields of study, have suggested that seduction was a big part of her strategy. Especially since her true dominance didn't happen until the ascension of Guangxu to the throne when she was 46 years old. Before that she had to share power with Prince Gong and a number of other important members of the dynasty and the bureaucracy. And even from that point onwards, she maintained power through frequent purges, not seduction.

Also, one of her major sources of power compared to other concubines was better education, in that she was literate, which is kind of a big deal for politics. Especially in a political system valuing formal learning as much as the imperial Chinese.

[detritus]

Which way is the power working? Is she using her sexuality to attract him, or is he using the promise of financial wealth to attract her?

This is also a tiny portion of the population; saying that because "women can just get a rich husband," women can be powerful with sex is ridiculous. Some women might be able to; it is not true for most women, and it does little to address the power imbalance.

EDIT: for clarity, it's about as ridiculous as saying that women just want money, so a rich man can manipulate women, and thus men have "power." It simply does not hold true in general, even if it might hold true in specific instances.

1.I'd say power works both ways in this instance.
2.I never said it addressed any power imbalance, perceived or real. I was answering the previous post. You are correct, it is a tiny minority, however, it can be done. Interesting that this is seen as acting like a prostitute however.
3. Are we still talking about sexism in RPG's here or real life? If it's the latter I suspect you are getting bogged down in incidental details rather than looking at the whole picture - I don't know of a single woman who has been held back in her choice of career because of her gender, and yes I know a large number of women from university onwards. I'm married to a director of an international company, frankly I pity anyone who tries to tell her she can't do anything because she's female.

back on topic a little -

Sexism in the lazy trope of rescuing the damsel in distress may be simply poor writing in terms of literature but as far as an RPG hook goes it's a quick and easy way of getting players to somewhere you want them to be - it doesn't have to end with her swooning over the muscly fighter if you don't want it to.

[Mr. Mask]

Themrys: Well, you've got a good head on your shoulders.

I'm particularly disturbed by how women are manipulated into putting themselves into disempowered, sometimes hellish existences, because of a misunderstanding of how they, "should," be and act. So, I was tempted to post in agreement, and so have.

[Werekat]

FrozenFeet: then I have a question and two comments:

1) does your own argument withstand 'different societies'? If so, how? I honestly can't see it: either you devalue both our arguments or neither.

2) it's not just social strata. I've talked to women from both the poorest villages (I did a brief stint in ethnography) and the richest cities. Just as even weak, intelligent men are seen as someone to fight by other men, similarly women are seen as objects to be attacked regardless of how powerful the man is. In fact, the less powerful he is in life, the more likely he is to take it out on the nearby women, and they, in turn, take it out on children. The most horrible stories I've ever heard of were from villages past the brink of poverty.

3) Yeah, I think the world would be better off if all able persons were taught at least when to fight and when to flee. It's the same level of distrust as locking your door when you leave the house.

Lord Smeagle: I think there's a line between: "Wow, that's cool enough to merit being a bit uncomfortable" and "Ouch, that's gonna be a... Pain." The "gonna be a pain" kind ruins all hope of identifying with the heroine for me personally. So to me it isn't a nitpick, it's something that makes me actively cringe. The arteries are laid bare, the inner thigh takes a ton of time to heal (and there will be multiple scratches) not to mention it's leaving sensitive parts wide open for any cold or breeze. To get an idea of how it should feel, one can try wearing speedos into brush with thorns sometime. Doesn't that mental image make you cringe?

There's a ton of cool skirts you can wear for the weather. Long, comfortable, woolen skirts with pockets. They're not that short. And anyone that goes wood-hopping knows that you wear long pants and shirts. You can roll sleeves and pant legs up, but you can't make cloth appear from nowhere if you need it.

So... Pretty stuff - sure, yeah. Stuff that just screams "face, meet palm" - nah.

And yeah, I agree that the murderhobos don't need to dress sexy. So it's better if they don't, unless it's to make a point. :P

Some more general points: now that I think about it, the alternative to sexism is... Women playing men. Most of the time. In post-Soviet LARP there's whole LARPs, 50-60 people, which are composed up to 90% of women, but whose roles are 90% male. Because Tolkien has so few female characters, especially in the First Era, women see no active roles for themselves and crossplay. Not because it's fun - because there's no alternative. It's kind of depressing, because it creates a wide rift between the genders - you wouldn't believe what these women have to hear from men.

On an interesting note, I had a fun spontaneous follow-up experiment. I was talking to my boyfriend when I said: "It might be interesting to have a LARP event with two separate castes. One has a warriors' honor and ethic, is allowed to bear arms, but must answer any insult with a duel of honor, risking death or at least injury each time.

The other - let's call them 'healers' - isn't allowed to bear arms, and if a healer does take up arms, they are scorned by everyone and aren't afforded any of the privileges of their caste, as it is considered that healers lose their ability to heal properly if they take up arms. Their honor is in quietly supporting the warriors in their fights, the quieter - the better. If a warrior does attack them, well, it's the healer's problem to find a warrior to defend them. It's considered honorless for a warrior to attack a healer, but special circumstances can mitigate that dishonor.'

My boyfriend's first reaction? 'No one is going to want to play the healers.'

And that, I think, is the crux of the problem with sexism in gaming. It's not fun to drag the entire 'women must' thing into our fantasy. There's men who insist on dragging it in, because it suits them just fine. But there are very few women who actually enjoy the full social pressures of being a woman in their game.

And if it isn't fun, why drag it into our free time?

Before you comment on the 'insist on dragging': for example, I've had a guy trying to play a 'near-rape-experience' storyline with me the first day we met. Of course, for him it was a story of someone trying to stop himself from giving in to his base urges. But he didn't even try to ask me if I was OK with it. Since I'm interested in gender issues, I'd tested a few strategies of my own that time (I actually have that experience written up, I could translate it and post it, if someone's interested), but if it hadn't been me? If it had been someone with a trigger?

Another interesting tidbit from that same trend: many post-Soviet LARPs, again, have freaking rules for rape. I've been boycotting games with rape rules, and the group I make games with doesn't have them as a matter of principle, and most of the mostly-female LARPs don't have them, either, but for larger games it's... Considered to be "just another part of the game, what, do you have a problem with it or something?"

This is the kind of stuff that starts small and also the kind of stuff most women want to avoid.

[Themrys]

Well there certainly have been honeypot type spy things in the real world, so there are real femme fatales. Who have used that methodology to extract information. Obviously there are ethical questions involved, but it certainly exists. It's a legitimate a tactic in intelligence as using money or blackmail.


This is not power, this is the "power" derived from the appearance of harmlessness.

A ninja may disguise as farmer in order to assassinate a nobleman. Would you argue that farmers, therefore, are powerful and dangerous?

Besides, a female spy does not herself wield power. The people she works for do. The people she works for are likely to be male in a society where she can operate more successful than a male spy. The only thing she gets out of the whole thing is money. Money that she could have earned in an other, less risky way in a society where her intelligence is valued by people who are not forced to do so by the circumstances.


Sexyness doesn't equal power. Power equals power.

[detritus]

A woman may be a successful spy by looking like a stupid bimbo, but that's not using her sexyness as such, that's using disguise. Disguising as some other kind of person who is not taken seriously would work just as well.

The beautiful women married to rich, not very handsome men? Are either, for some reason or other, truly in love with those men, or prostitutes by an other name.

I think you are 100% wrong about that - as I said before men are inherently stupid when it comes to a good looking woman. Using her sexiness is exactly what it is, call it a disguise if you like but that doesn't change what it is. I doubt that "disguising" herself as say, a train spotter or LARPer wold be successful. Look up the Profumo affair as a classic example of a man being an idiot when faced with a pretty woman.

[AMFV]

This is not power, this is the "power" derived from the appearance of harmlessness.

A ninja may disguise as farmer in order to assassinate a nobleman. Would you argue that farmers, therefore, are powerful and dangerous?

Besides, a female spy does not herself wield power. The people she works for do. The people she works for are likely to be male in a society where she can operate more successful than a male spy. The only thing she gets out of the whole thing is money. Money that she could have earned in an other, less risky way in a society where her intelligence is valued by people who are not forced to do so by the circumstances.


Sexyness doesn't equal power. Power equals power.

It is very unlikely that female spies consider themselves to be prostitutes or are working simply for money. Odds are high that they do what they do because they believe it to be right. Morally correct to serve their countries. That isn't a male exclusive sentiment, many of the honeypot type stories I know of deal with Soviets, who were among the most egalitarian societies in many (though not all) respects, at the very least this was a stated goal of their countries, as such it is likely that the women believed themselves to be doing what was morally right.

Sexiness in this case is a tool, much like any other, some women are strong, some are sexy, some are both, the same for men, and using your inherent attractiveness or strength is the core of what real power is, in that sense sexiness is power.

[Segev]

To give something to discuss on, I've decided to take on Segev's challenge and genderflip my analysis on Legend of Zelda. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=16209287#post16209287) So I present to you: Legend of Link. Which one do you think is more offensive?



This won't make much sense if you aren't familiar with Zelda games, but eh. For extra context, this would be 3d action adventure where our plucky tomboy Zelda goes around slaying monsters, solving puzzles and generally being awesome while the titular prince mostly stays in the background. Oh yeah, and every positively portrayed man swoons over her.

For extra kicks, I'll invert my analysis on Gerudo as well:
Many pages late, but I only just now read it. I wanted, however, to thank you for this, as it's an interesting read. (Did take me a bit to realize you'd swapped some characters - or at least their names - around rather than swapping just their genders and altering their names, but it serves the purpose well regardless.)

In the Gerudo analysis, one thing that strikes me is that it is somehow creepier when male!Gerudo are suddenly all eyeing heroine!Zelda like somebody they'd like to "get to know better" in a semi-predatory way than it is in the actual game where female!Gerudo are all eyeing hero!Link that way. It's mildly humorous to have that comment implying nervousness on his part; it's at least mildly disturbing to consider that heroine!Zelda might be concerned about unwanted advances.

(Or, at least, I believe it such. Others may differ, and upon reflection it certainly is a revelatory distinction in attitude. Which is no small part of the reason for this exercise: to see how inverting the genders changes the perceptions.)

Again with the Gerudo gender-swap, a society of rapacious men who kidnap women is pretty horrific. A society of rapacious women who kidnap men is "exotic." I imagine that the male!Gerudo would not have been so readily "forgiven" when they decided they liked heroine!Zelda as the female!Gerudo were when they decided they liked hero!Link.

[The Oni]

[history stuff]

...Wikipedia (and Encylopedia Britannica, if you're not crazy about the former) doesn't seem to support those assertions. It seems Ci Xi's father was an ordinary official, and she herself was considered a "low-ranking" concubine but was one of the few chosen to stay at the main palace, so it doesn't seem like nepotism was the motivation there.

[Segev]

Sexyness doesn't equal power. Power equals power.

Sexyness, like wealth or a persuasive tongue, is a form of power. It enables you to manipulate others. You can claim "but it's those others who have the power," and you'd be partially right. But likewise, Joffery Baratheon sitting on his throne couldn't beat any of the Knights, or many others he bullies or otherwise abuses, in personal combat. He commands those with skill and might of physical arms to do the harm.

The argument that the "sexy woman" doesn't have power would require that you also argue that the "ennobled brat" doesn't have power. Both merely have the capacity to manipulate/command others into doing their bidding.

Sexiness is power to influence the will and desire of others.

[Scow2]

I doubt the totally of your observations of sexual interactions between genders show women manipulating men with sex.
If by totality you mean that every interaction between man an woman has the woman manipulating the man with sex appeal and power-from-sex, certainly not. But in that in the totality of my observation I have seen it happen in recognizable patterns to the point it can't be dismissed as "a lie"? Absolutely.


This is not power, this is the "power" derived from the appearance of harmlessness.

A ninja may disguise as farmer in order to assassinate a nobleman. Would you argue that farmers, therefore, are powerful and dangerous?Are you saying the farmers are not powerful and dangerous? Power is available to anyone who has the wisdom to see the gaps and openings in the system and exploit them. The System disempowers everyone who strictly plays by the rules, no matter what system or who they are. In order to succeed, you have to break from the system.


Besides, a female spy does not herself wield power. The people she works for do. The people she works for are likely to be male in a society where she can operate more successful than a male spy. The only thing she gets out of the whole thing is money. Money that she could have earned in an other, less risky way in a society where her intelligence is valued by people who are not forced to do so by the circumstances. Sex appeal is one of, not the only, tools available to a woman. Also, Life isn't about money: Money is a means to an end, not the end itself. Everyone is someone else's fool. The female spy DOES wield power - Information is power, and she can get information in ways others cannot.

Right now, the problem isn't the existence of known gender roles, and civilization as we know it is built on them. The problem with sexism is a failure to recognize when someone chooses to diverge from the gender roles, or outright rejecting those who do.


Sexyness doesn't equal power. Power equals power.Every aspect of someone's existence is a tool, including sex appeal. The more tools someone has, and more situations they can apply them to, the more power they have as well (See: D&D's Wizards - they have ALL the tools).

You keep saying there are five fingers held up, when only four are visible.

[Mr. Mask]

I think you are 100% wrong about that - as I said before men are inherently stupid when it comes to a good looking woman. Using her sexiness is exactly what it is, call it a disguise if you like but that doesn't change what it is. I doubt that "disguising" herself as say, a train spotter or LARPer wold be successful. Look up the Profumo affair as a classic example of a man being an idiot when faced with a pretty woman. It's a little hard to say if that's an advantage. I mean, an Anglo-Saxon can't pose as a Mexican, but we don't really consider being Mexican an advantage.

You could argue that women have more positions available to them which they can assume when spying or the like, I suppose (I haven't put enough thought into it to say whether they do or don't).

[crayzz]

I think you are 100% wrong about that - as I said before men are inherently stupid when it comes to a good looking woman.

We really aren't. You might be; the men you've met might be; but I've met enough men who aren't like this to say that it is not universal.

EDIT: indeed, the existence of asexual people (http://asexualawarenessweek.com/asexuality-101/) alone destroys this idea. Humans are complicated; such simplifications help no one.


But in that in the totality of my observation I have seen it happen in recognizable patterns to the point it can't be dismissed as "a lie"? Absolutely.

I think you're confused; no one is saying that women never manipulate men with sex. What was argued is that is such does not hold true in general. It happens, I know. Now you need to demonstrate that it happens regularly; that such is a reliable form of power that women as a group have, rather than individuals in specific circumstances.


Right now, the problem isn't the existence of known gender roles, and civilization as we know it is built on them. The problem with sexism is a failure to recognize when someone chooses to diverge from the gender roles, or outright rejecting those who do.

What you've defined as the problem and what you've described as not a problem are, in fact, the same thing. If we are free to choose as we please, then there are no roles.

[Terraoblivion]

...Wikipedia (and Encylopedia Britannica, if you're not crazy about the former) doesn't seem to support those assertions. It seems Ci Xi's father was an ordinary official, and she herself was considered a "low-ranking" concubine but was one of the few chosen to stay at the main palace, so it doesn't seem like nepotism was the motivation there.

You don't become an imperial concubine by being pretty. Which should be pretty obvious, the emperor isn't going out to find them himself and the people who do it aren't going to be the ones sleeping with then. As for her initial rise to a favoured status was helped out a lot by actually having a kid. As for the other assertions, I looked at Wikipedia to confirm the dates. Also, a quick check on Wikipedia for a matter you don't know about isn't terribly impressive as scholarship goes. Go read an actual book on Chinese history before making assertions about it.

[The Oni]

Again with the Gerudo gender-swap, a society of rapacious men who kidnap women is pretty horrific. A society of rapacious women who kidnap men is "exotic." I imagine that the male!Gerudo would not have been so readily "forgiven" when they decided they liked heroine!Zelda as the female!Gerudo were when they decided they liked hero!Link.

Well, this comes from the entirely mistaken idea that rape is inherently a male act, which in turn comes from the fact that it tends to be harder for women to commit it. The idea is that the Gerudo men are gonna get right to it with a captured Hyrulian lady, while the Gerudo ladies are just gonna let the guy sit in a cell until he decides he wants one (or several) of them (which of course, he does, he's male.). The situation is really no less rapey with the Gerudo women than with the Gerudo men. - but again, that's a greater gender equality issue which should disappear, mostly, as sexism does.


Power is power

Cersei (also from Game of Thrones) said "Power is power," the irony being most of her power is derived from her marriage. Her power is no more real than Joffrey's is (though it is powerful!). Xykon said the same line in this very webcomic, but acknowledged the myriad forms it can take.

Sex appeal alone is not the sort of weapon that wins you kingdoms - but it IS a weapon. You wouldn't go into battle with a sword and nothing else would you? That would be silly. It takes more than one weapon to win a war.




Before you comment on the 'insist on dragging': for example, I've had a guy trying to play a 'near-rape-experience' storyline with me the first day we met. Of course, for him it was a story of someone trying to stop himself from giving in to his base urges. But he didn't even try to ask me if I was OK with it. Since I'm interested in gender issues, I'd tested a few strategies of my own that time (I actually have that experience written up, I could translate it and post it, if someone's interested), but if it hadn't been me? If it had been someone with a trigger?

Well hey, if you were cool with that, then that's great...I guess, seems mildly creepy that he'd suggest it the first day you met though. Especially yeah, not knowing anything about you.




I think there's a line between: "Wow, that's cool enough to merit being a bit uncomfortable" and "Ouch, that's gonna be a... Pain." The "gonna be a pain" kind ruins all hope of identifying with the heroine for me personally. So to me it isn't a nitpick, it's something that makes me actively cringe. The arteries are laid bare, the inner thigh takes a ton of time to heal (and there will be multiple scratches) not to mention it's leaving sensitive parts wide open for any cold or breeze. To get an idea of how it should feel, one can try wearing speedos into brush with thorns sometime. Doesn't that mental image make you cringe?


It sounds like what you're saying is you don't identify with a heroine who wouldn't wear super-practical clothing into combat (or a thick forest). And I can completely understand that. I don't think I could relate to having to play a character who is a Vow of Poverty monk. It's just so far from my own mindset I couldn't even get into the character. But, that doesn't mean I think the idea of Vow of Poverty monks are stupid, any more than I think an unarmored Oracle is bad just because she could get away with wearing armor.

[TheFallenOne]

An interesting viewpoint, but one I'm not sure I agree with. While you point to the cover of Masters of the Wild, I'd point to the iconic image from the 3.5 book...

<image>

A Krusk who is half-dressed... but that's because he's wearing shorts and short sleeves. There is a significant body of work with barbarians being half-naked, and I'm certainly not going to argue that, but as my reference to the Shortpacked comic showed, those representations are not necessarily equal... the men are powerfully muscled, sometimes attractively scarred, whereas the women tend to be lithe and scarless... even if they are utterly uncovered in places people like to put knives, and swinging weapons larger than themselves.

So, while there may be an element of "uncovered because she's a barbarian", that's not the only issue at work.

That's one image, there's still a plethora of barechested barbarians in all media forms. So maybe it's a mix of her being female and her being a barbarian, but the point is this: when trying to prove a statement, wherever possible try to field the best arguments in favour, not those that are questionable and easy to attack(because chances are it is those that your opposition will focus on). Often when an argument you brought up is disproven your overall position will appear weaker than it would have if you never made that argument in the first place.
So, drop the barbarian. You don't need it, there are plenty other inadequately dressed/armored fantasy females to choose from.

You also started on something I'd like to separate from the clothing issue, and that is body shapes. Here too we indeed have a problem. Female body shape depictions tend to be pretty similar, independent of the depicted character's physical abilities. Like the lithe barbarian; you don't see strong females that are built like olympic weightlifters or bodybuilders. I think that is because women with that look are considered unappealing, whereas men with lots of muscle and the V-shape chest are considered heroic and attractive(although I think many men overestimate how appealing the average woman considers that type of physique. I've seen references to a study on that, but never read the study itself so don't take my word on it).

Straying a bit from fantasy I think Marvel comics are a splendid example. In the things I read the female physical powerhouses don't look much different from the non-physical females. She-Hulk a bit, although she still has the same overall shape. One more odd case is Exiles Heather Hudson, who has the standard shape but transforms into a giant white yeti.
Male powerhouses on the other hand are most often giants and mounds of muscle. Although we also see that the idealized character depiction cuts both ways if we notice how common a good amount of muscle and the heroic V-shape is on the male heroes, even those that aren't 'melees'. Although a comparison of clothing shows that they are far less sexualized.


I mean I don't think that it should matter in game terms though. If I'm playing a guy that can create fire with his mind or turn into a dragon, I'm certainly not going to object to a lady who can lift far more than any human being possibly could, because it's fun, and getting to an argument over realism in any game tends to wind up with the game getting less fun for at least one person.

I call this the 'But there's dragons!' fallacy. I don't like it. It's when you think it pointless or even wrong to even out unrealistic things because you already accepted something more unrealistic, like dragons or magic. That's just wrong. Only because I already accepted dragons doesn't mean I'm not allowed to strive for a game that is realistic and consistent in lesser aspects. I'd not allow a horse to climb up a rope even though with its strength modifier it would easily be able to do so. Because realism.
Not allowing females with superhuman strength in fantasy is wrong, but that wrongness has absolutely nothing to do with an inherent pointlessness of striving for realism.

[LibraryOgre]

There's nothing about Feiya there that would be a hindrance to her doing her job. Exposed cleavage isn't going to leave her any more vulnerable than cloth to most stuff, and that's all she can wear anyway. I'd say this is a solid adventuing outfit for her, with lots of storage space for her spell components and wands. No problems here.

No, her outfit is not an adventuring hindrance. However, it is pretty suicide girls for a person who is socially awkward and raised by hags.


Alhazra...I would argue she actually IS saved by her character sheet, which explicitly mentions she avoids being in frontline combat, and she's statted for that sort of build. If she were, say, a Battle or Metal oracle? No, walking around like that would be dumb as all hell, but her Mystery is Flame. She's definitely artillery, not infantry, so I'd say...she's being vain, but not overtly stupid.

In both cases, however, they're dressed at odds with their equipment. Alhazra could be wearing studded leather (as on her character sheet), but she is, instead, in beach wear. Sure, she avoids frontline combat... but she also wears armor. She's not depicted as wearing armor, though, or in anything resembling sensible adventuring attire.

[Scow2]

What you've defined as the problem and what you've described as not a problem are, in fact, the same thing. If we are free to choose as we please, then there are no roles.They're only "The same" if there are no discernible trending differences between male and female brain and body development and function. Gender Roles are nothing more than a large majority of the population of one gender tending toward sets of tasks in society. It becomes a problem when those roles are systematically enforced.

"Soft" Gender roles allow for the acknowledgement of the possibility that men and women do tend think and act differently on a fundamental level, without forcing those who think outside of such trends into jobs and roles they don't want, while not forcing those who do conform with the thought trends into roles they don't want (Well, at least not into roles they don't want any more than anyone else is forced to take jobs because of socioeconomic pressures. I want to be a multibillionaire celebrity for a living. I wash dishes at a bar.)

[Alberic Strein]

Many many points

As for me, I have been GMing a campaign with two female players for a bit over two years now. Well, actually, at first it was 5 men and 3 women, but real quickly only those two remained.

Due to my GMing style, improvisation and impersonation, when I usually have to create a character on the fly, it is more often than not a man. Not because men are superior or any B-S like that, but because as a man it's easier for me to "play" a man. And when they react with any undefined PNJ (like grabbing some person in the street) it's like they react with "me" just like a player identifies with his/her character. Is it sexist, because women and men are not represented equally? If you say so... But it also means that my players (women) are shutting up men most of the time, which could be considered pro-feminist.

Anyway, since I GM MRQII, women and men have absolutely nothing to tell them apart game-wise, so I guess I avoid most of the issues. Yet again, I have not played a single game where the system enforced women as inferior to men. Not once.

Since I impersonate most enemies and PNJs, I can't exactly have the subject of rape popping up every now and then. It just feels... Unhealthy. However, if they ask what happened when an army raided and destroyed a village, then yeah, the whole rape thing might come up. In other words it exists in the world they live in, but I don't physically confront them with it just for the hell of it.

Broos are another matter entirely. Broos are my favorite adventurer-motivating monsters. They are the most disgusting thing ever, rapists, and you're 100% to get pregnant with an embryo that will end up killing you. However, they are not gender sensitive. They are just as likely to do that to a male. As monsters, they get very different reactions from adventurers, men and women alike, compared to normal monsters, so I like using them to "force" a bit of roleplaying.

But those guys excepted, I never had a single being, a single human male, threaten them with rape. Is it in relation to sexism? Not in the least. As GM you play a world you're comfortable with and ones you find interesting. If my players start asking for more female NPC or enemies and such, then sure, why not. But as long as they're not bothered by it, how high or low on the sexism scale does my campaign stand really doesn't move me.

[The Oni]

You don't become an imperial concubine by being pretty. Which should be pretty obvious, the emperor isn't going out to find them himself and the people who do it aren't going to be the ones sleeping with then. As for her initial rise to a favoured status was helped out a lot by actually having a kid. As for the other assertions, I looked at Wikipedia to confirm the dates. Also, a quick check on Wikipedia for a matter you don't know about isn't terribly impressive as scholarship goes. Go read an actual book on Chinese history before making assertions about it.

Pardon me. Between reading up on WWII and Feudal Japanese histories and Norse and Greek mythologies, I must have missed that one. :smallannoyed: There aren't enough hours in the day to become an expert on everything, that's what the Internet is for. How DO you become an Imperial concubine, then?

[The Oni]

In both cases, however, they're dressed at odds with their equipment. Alhazra could be wearing studded leather (as on her character sheet), but she is, instead, in beach wear. Sure, she avoids frontline combat... but she also wears armor. She's not depicted as wearing armor, though, or in anything resembling sensible adventuring attire.

...Fair enough. In that case, it's the fault of the artists, and the designers for not communicating with the artists.

[Werekat]

Well hey, if you were cool with that, then that's great...I guess, seems mildly creepy that he'd suggest it the first day you met though. Especially yeah, not knowing anything about you.

Not really cool. It was creepy as hell, and the only reason I was remotely ready was because I'd invested entirely too much time into studying social dynamics. And the fact that this was an online game. If something like that happened IRL, I'd have made myself scarce far quicker, because a ton of warning bells were going off even before he got to the attempt. And IRL, you're never sure where they're gonna stop.


It sounds like what you're saying is you don't identify with a heroine who wouldn't wear super-practical clothing into combat (or a thick forest). And I can completely understand that. I don't think I could relate to having to play a character who is a Vow of Poverty monk. It's just so far from my own mindset I couldn't even get into the character. But, that doesn't mean I think the idea of Vow of Poverty monks are stupid, any more than I think an unarmored Oracle is bad just because she could get away with wearing armor.

I don't really mind 'impractical' so much as 'cross-the-line' impractical. I know two girls who walked across half of Spain in shorts and t-shirts, which I would have never done because of my own standards of practicality, but it worked for them and I admit that it *can* work. But they didn't do it in underwear, 'cause that would create entirely too many problems. I like saris for a jungle setting, for example - they work, but they are easy to move in and cover up most of the body.

Basically, what I want in my fantasy pictures is something that doesn't break verisimilitude and shows my adventurer in their daily 'working' getup.

[Themrys]

As for me, I have been GMing a campaign with two female players for a bit over two years now. Well, actually, at first it was 5 men and 3 women, but real quickly only those two remained.

Due to my GMing style, improvisation and impersonation, when I usually have to create a character on the fly, it is more often than not a man. Not because men are superior or any B-S like that, but because as a man it's easier for me to "play" a man.

Why is it easier for you to play a man? Is it so important in that setting whether it's a woman or a man? If you ask for the way, do you get different answers from women and men?

The GM of my group does this, too, and I don't like it. I don't dislike it enough to complain, since he seems insecure and I don't want to hurt him, but ... it does get on my nerves that about the only women that turn up are those who have sex with the male PCs , or NPCs that are stereotypically expected to be female.

[detritus]

We really aren't. You might be; the men you've met might be; but I've met enough men who aren't like this to say that it is not universal.

EDIT: indeed, the existence of asexual people (http://asexualawarenessweek.com/asexuality-101/) alone destroys this idea. Humans are complicated; such simplifications help no one.

I think you're confused; no one is saying that women never manipulate men with sex. What was argued is that is such does not hold true in general. It happens, I know. Now you need to demonstrate that it happens regularly; that such is a reliable form of power that women as a group have, rather than individuals in specific circumstances.




OK, maybe I should have said "in general" men are idiots when it comes to women. I don't see how a few "asexual" people (and they are very few) invalidates my point. But consider this, you're a middle aged, wealthy businessman, a young attractive PA flirts with you - you're telling me you won't respond?
As I said, some women can and do manipulate men. Not all.

[The Oni]

Not really cool. It was creepy as hell, and the only reason I was remotely ready was because I'd invested entirely too much time into studying social dynamics. And the fact that this was an online game. If something like that happened IRL, I'd have made myself scarce far quicker, because a ton of warning bells were going off even before he got to the attempt. And IRL, you're never sure where they're gonna stop.

I guess I don't see where you're coming from with this one. :smallfrown: Either you're interested in doing something like that so you go ahead with it, or you're far too creeped out (understandably!) and you don't and presumably you slap the guy on your ignore list faster than you can say "Sunder Armor." Was this, like, for a research project or what?




I don't really mind 'impractical' so much as 'cross-the-line' impractical. I know two girls who walked across half of Spain in shorts and t-shirts, which I would have never done because of my own standards of practicality, but it worked for them and I admit that it *can* work. But they didn't do it in underwear, 'cause that would create entirely too many problems. I like saris for a jungle setting, for example - they work, but they are easy to move in and cover up most of the body.

Basically, what I want in my fantasy pictures is something that doesn't break verisimilitude and shows my adventurer in their daily 'working' getup.

And that makes sense. Lots of Pathfinder characters have that, such as Kyra the Iconic Cleric. Her outfit is visually interesting, but there's nothing about it that would be considered fanservice, and it looks like it protects a good bit.

[Alberic Strein]

Why is it easier for you to play a man? Is it so important in that setting whether it's a woman or a man? If you ask for the way, do you get different answers from women and men?

...Because I'm a male? My voice is male (with which I make the NPC speak) and my thought process is male too. Honestly I don't have THE FAINTEST IDEA how a woman would think, and respond in some complex situation. When they catch an NPC it's not to ask them the time of the day and if they pull weird crap, I have no idea how to give a half realistic reaction from a woman's point of view.

I know how I would react and it makes easy for me to give some half realistic male behaviour.



The GM of my group does this, too, and I don't like it. I don't dislike it enough to complain, since he seems insecure and I don't want to hurt him, but ... it does get on my nerves that about the only women that turn up are those who have sex with the male PCs , or NPCs that are stereotypically expected to be female.

You must have misread me. The typical NPC, the one which holds absolutely no relevance to anything has a clear tendency to be male.

That specific kind of NPC. The NPCs which matter on some levels are not always male. My players often meet women on their travels and specific characters with plot relevance can be female, and actually a number of them are.

My players met the Gorgons, helped Eugenie Danglars and Louise D'Armilly not only hook up together but actually conceive a child, they are in route to meet a female Diviner to help them in their quest, their quest being to find 7 warriors to save the world, 2 of them being female and one shifting between male and female. Since I still have some time before they find some of them, I could sex shift one or two more. They are still in contact with one of the former player's sisters, the elder one being a knowledge brooker and the most influential member of the family. They met mermaid and mermen, which alluded to their next ruler being female. One of my player worships Athena and boy is she vocal about things when my players make contact. The Latin Gods are there too and Aphrodite ships one of my female players with a male NPC. The early days of the campaign were littered with romantic shenanigans which were interesting because the women WERE NOT average NPCs, but family members, NPCs they absolutely adored, and other players. One of my players ended up pregnant and the child was female.

It's not that there are no NPC women in my campaign. They just don't tend to be the average Joe. Actually it's exactly that. There are women and men, but when they grab the average Joe, I most usually make him a Joe, not a Jane. Simply because it's easier and more natural for me to simply say

"W-What can I do to help you?" in a terrified voice

Than

"The frightened female peasant looks at you in stupor a few seconds before asking you what you want to do with her." which forces me to use indirect speech

Or using a high-pitched tone... Which does not bode well...

Or speaking in my normal voice but double-checking each and every words I use so the female NPC (in her grumpy rough voice) does not speak in a masculine way.

Also, pulling a female NPC out of my hat forces me to use stereotypes since I didn't have time to come up with a character. While the female NPC's that they are supposed to meet have a character (a bit) fleshed out which allows me to be creative and avoid stereotypes.

There is no shortage of strong and independent women in my world. Which seems to be quite a stark departure from your Game Master's DM'ing.

[Werekat]

I guess I don't see where you're coming from with this one. :smallfrown: Either you're interested in doing something like that so you go ahead with it, or you're far too creeped out (understandably!) and you don't and presumably you slap the guy on your ignore list faster than you can say "Sunder Armor." Was this, like, for a research project or what?

'Research project' is about as close as you can get, yes. Basically, what I had on my hands was a classic lead in to rape as I've read it in studies and heard first hand from witnesses. Since it was in an online environment, I could call the mods at any moment, and, moreover, the person in question was quite unlikely to have any means of physically reaching me, I decided to follow through and see what would happen to a well-meaning person who had simply not faced similar situations before. I was mostly amazed at how... Classical the experience was. It was like he had read all the books I had - except he hadn't, if our OOC conversation is to be believed.

Interestingly, the classic lead in to rape? A wounded and barely-moving knight in shining armor who, upon seeing a capable and healthy woman offering him help immediately attempted to attach himself to her as her 'protector.'


And that makes sense. Lots of Pathfinder characters have that, such as Kyra the Iconic Cleric. Her outfit is visually interesting, but there's nothing about it that would be considered fanservice, and it looks like it protects a good bit.

Yes, exactly. I like her depiction a lot, probably the most of all the women who don't emphasize armor in Pathfinder. But, for example, Lini's armor and Merisiel's armor is stuff that makes me go, 'Yeah, that would never work, but it looks pretty cool, I'll give it a pass.'

[Coidzor]

Why is it easier for you to play a man? Is it so important in that setting whether it's a woman or a man? If you ask for the way, do you get different answers from women and men?

The GM of my group does this, too, and I don't like it. I don't dislike it enough to complain, since he seems insecure and I don't want to hurt him, but ... it does get on my nerves that about the only women that turn up are those who have sex with the male PCs , or NPCs that are stereotypically expected to be female.

Isn't that the case with most male players unless they've been actively pressured into roleplaying the opposite sex, it's easier for them because they're more familiar with doing it and they've got the experiences of being male and the expectations of them for being male to draw upon? My recollection is that female players have pressures on them to play male characters, but male players have no similar pressures on them to play female characters in the general and those who do make a habit of it are viewed as odd, unusual, or possibly trans/gay.

That does sound like it'd be pretty damn annoying, yeah, and one of those things that seems like it'd just have to almost certainly be problematic in the first case. I have to admit though, it does require some effort to remember to have the characters I make to populate my setting reflect the egalitarian nature of it. On the other hand, I don't really have any desire to roleplay out sex and seduction with my fellow players, and I've never really seen the appeal of delving into it.

[Segev]

Female gamers have pressures on them to play male characters? :smallconfused:

[Werekat]

Segev, sure. I had a post on the last page about LARPs that were 90% female in 90% male roles. 'Cause setting.

And in some groups it's easier to play a guy and not get hit on if you don't want to be hit on.

[Topus]

male players have no similar pressures on them to play female characters in the general and those who do make a habit of it are viewed as odd, unusual, or possibly trans/gay.
No way, i have a straight male friend who usually roleplays female characters, and no one ever thought him to be weird, effeminate or hidden homosexual.

[The Oni]

^ Completely depends on the group.

[Morithias]

I question if it's "pressures" or more no one cares.

Female player plays a male character, no one bats an eye.

Male player plays a female character, they apparently have mommy issues, and want to be beaten by strong females. Either that or they're gay.

[Astrella]

I feel like media plays a part in men finding it harder to put themselves in a woman's perspective. (And similar with regards to other minorities.) There are just more male-character centered stories out there, so as a girl you're way more likely to have read those while the opposite is a lot less likely.

I don't really get where the "I have no clue what a woman thinks like" thing comes from though. Yes, people's thought patterns and responses and such vary a lot, but that's among people as a group. And sure, society has an influence, but it's not like the way people think is divided into two groups along gender.

[The Oni]

I read a study somewhere that suggested androgynous people - that is, women who were masculine and men who were feminine - tended to be more popular writers; the idea being that they wrote both genders better because they could relate to either more easily.

[hamishspence]

I don't really get where the "I have no clue what a woman thinks like" thing comes from though. Yes, people's thought patterns and responses and such vary a lot, but that's among people as a group. And sure, society has an influence, but it's not like the way people think is divided into two groups along gender.
Though a lot of books have been published emphasing the differences between the two.

"Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus"
really needs a sequel:
"Men Are From Earth, Women Are From Earth, Get Used To It" :smallamused:

[Topus]

Male player plays a female character, they apparently have mommy issues, and want to be beaten by strong females. Either that or they're gay.
Seriously, I don't know what kind of gaming group you spend time with, but as a man i find this generalization quite offensive.

[AMFV]

I call this the 'But there's dragons!' fallacy. I don't like it. It's when you think it pointless or even wrong to even out unrealistic things because you already accepted something more unrealistic, like dragons or magic. That's just wrong. Only because I already accepted dragons doesn't mean I'm not allowed to strive for a game that is realistic and consistent in lesser aspects. I'd not allow a horse to climb up a rope even though with its strength modifier it would easily be able to do so. Because realism.
Not allowing females with superhuman strength in fantasy is wrong, but that wrongness has absolutely nothing to do with an inherent pointlessness of striving for realism.

It's not an inherent pointlessness in striving for realism, rather it's that fantasy games are inherently wish fulfillment. Why should my wishes be considered to be more significant than anybody elses'? If somebody wants to create a character that is a talking horse who can climb ropes, then I'll try to figure out a way to make that believable, in the case of women who are strong, I've noticed there isn't much work necessary for verisimilitude, people tend to accept

[Terraoblivion]

Pardon me. Between reading up on WWII and Feudal Japanese histories and Norse and Greek mythologies, I must have missed that one. :smallannoyed:

It doesn't take much more than a basic understanding of how empires work to realize that concubines in a place as large as China don't get picked based on prettiness. Or for that most concubines don't achieve great political power the way Cixi did, making appeals to her status as one as the source of her power pretty hollow.

Also, if you use the term "feudal Japan", then it's pretty clear that you haven't studied the complex political and social structures of any given period of pre-Meiji Japanese history or even really recognize the great differences between different periods. And in general, that list suggests the reading of someone without professional training in history, so I'd appreciate if you didn't try to lecture me on the field of scholarship that I have a degree in and is currently finishing up a graduate degree in.


There aren't enough hours in the day to become an expert on everything, that's what the Internet is for. How DO you become an Imperial concubine, then?

I'm pretty sure the internet is for communication in general, not learning random disjointed factoids specifically. In any case, you typically become an imperial concubine by being from a high-ranking family with easy access to the location of the palace. In the case of Qing dynasty China specifically, you also had to be Manchu and from a clan that the emperor wished to favor and most likely from Beijing, nearby areas or one of the major cities of the east coast or lower Yangtze valley. Everything else would be too peripheral. Then after that, there was a formal selection process that you got signed up for and you got picked from there.

Also, I think you misunderstand how relatively high ranking a low level official is. Being an official at all, as opposed to someone who never took or the lowest level of civil service examination or succeeded but lacked open jobs, put you in the distinct upper class of China. You shouldn't imagine a basic paper pusher, but more a personal assistant to magistrates, an administrative officer in an army unit or similar. Graduation rates of even the Shengyuan examinations were quite low, most men never even attempted them and among the graduates a very high percentage didn't actually get any appointments.

So she wasn't some random nobody, but rather the daughter of a lower ranking member of the social elite who belonged to the dominant ethnic group and who grew up and lived in the capital.

And, again, Cixi's power stemmed from her political skill, rather than the simple fact that she was a concubine. There were dozens or hundreds of concubines at the same time as her and there had gone tens of thousand before her and only a tiny handful ever achieved power and none as completely as her.

[Segev]

The most recent female character I've played first showed up to the party as a youthful engineer named Lee. I was very careful to avoid using pronouns at all (which is a lot harder than it sounds), and described the character as being in the standard steampunk engineer type outfit and being lanky and a little scrawny with goggles serving as a sort of headband to hold short-cropped hair back off the face.

Lee is also a shapeshifted silver dragon. Her human form is not meant to be deceptive; she's just quite young and designed her human form to have minimal encumbering features. She responds equally well to being referred to as a boy or as a girl. If somebody actually made a deal over it, she'd be surprised it came up.

As a character, she's mostly obsessed with technology more than anything else. She's not particularly tomboyish in any other respect, and her greed is truly draconic in scope.

If the party ever has to go to a formal event of some sort, she'll actually "dress up" for it, and look properly feminine, because that's what you do when you're dressed up. Then all the decorative bits will be fitting. (Longer hair, more of a figure, dress, etc.) She has thought about this only once or twice, and then only in passing when she thought she was about to be invited to such an event. She wasn't sure if she would go; her airship needed repairs. ("Lee" is actually a mis-spelling of being short for "Sally," which itself is a mis-spelling of a shortening of her full draconic name.)

[AMFV]

I feel like media plays a part in men finding it harder to put themselves in a woman's perspective. (And similar with regards to other minorities.) There are just more male-character centered stories out there, so as a girl you're way more likely to have read those while the opposite is a lot less likely.

I don't really get where the "I have no clue what a woman thinks like" thing comes from though. Yes, people's thought patterns and responses and such vary a lot, but that's among people as a group. And sure, society has an influence, but it's not like the way people think is divided into two groups along gender.

Well there are certainly differences in thought patterns as produced by hormonal differences and cultural differences. It makes it difficult to be able to recognize how women are going to behave. For example, I will never understand what PMS or pregnancy is like and how that affects thought patterns. I assume there are things that are the opposite for men, but I can't think of any, mostly because I've always thought of things from my own perspective and haven't put myself in somebody else's perspective and then have them put themselves in my perspective, I'm not even sure if that would be possible.

[1337 b4k4]

I don't really get where the "I have no clue what a woman thinks like" thing comes from though.

Well, there's probably a couple of sources.

Let's start at the very bottom here: TTRPGs are primarily dominated by the geeks and other "odds" by definition, they have a hard enough time thinking like members of their own gender, let alone trying to understand how members of the opposite gender think.

Once we move beyond that, we get into the realm of guys who can't get past playing stereotypes when playing female characters.

Both of these are mostly functions of immaturity (in the literal, not pejorative sense).

Eventually, you (as a DM) come to realize that men and women for most purposes that an NPC would serve aren't going to be very different. Whether your blacksmith is male or female isn't likely to change the fact that they're going to haggle for the best price for their wares. The bar keep is just as likely to be surly to you, and the government official is just as likely to be snooty and dismissive.

But even here, you're likely to find your DM will chose characters that align with their own gender. Both for convenience (see above about voice pitch) but also because it's pervasive in society that men and women think differently (and they do, just not likely in ways that matter for NPCs). Heck, even in discussions on sexism (such as this one), you will find both straight accusations ("you cant understand because 'privilege' ") and ample experiential evidence that men and women do approach certain topics and situations with very different mindsets.

[Poison_Fish]

Werekat, I see where you're coming from, but it still fails the different society test. Here, the groups that have oligopoly on violence are not "men"; they are members of specific professions, which are partially composed of and ruled by women. The average man can't arbitrarily decide to break the double standard without repercussions.

And despite your dislike for words like kyrarchy, this is what an intersectional analysis is for. If you are looking at different forms of oppression, or in this case rather then oppression, control of violence to leverage over others (a form of power), you'll get a hierarchy of power based not just on profession, but wealth, social class, ethnicity, etc. Though there are women in those positions when you put such filters within an analysis, it is highly likely that those positions are majority male identified as well (on top of being coded as male). An example of such an analysis in law and strategies needed for 'success'. (http://hum.sagepub.com/content/66/2/245.abstract) It is also behind a pay-wall, so there is that.


Gender Roles are tradeoffs. Men are taught that empathy is weakness... because it interferes with self-reliance. On one hand, males are expected to put up with adversity and ultimately die young. In exchange, adversity builds character, and increases power and reputation. Everything someone who lives as Disposable earns is theirs, for themselves, those close to them, and their posterity. Many males (I don't know if it's a universal majority, but it is where I live) like this tradeoff, and see Feminism as a threat to what they've earned and what has been earned for them by those who came before - removing 'disposability' invalidates and struggle to get where we are, and taking that privilege away makes the past struggles worthless. Many women also want into this game. Others don't, but think they do. Many men want out of it... but to try to destroy that game entirely takes away from those who want to live by it, for better or worse.

I do not disagree that there can be trade offs in some cases, but i'll point that in terms of power/control/etc. it still ends in favor towards being male as of current outcomes. Destroying the status has never really been the major goal of most feminist spheres. Equalizing the playing field (opportunities, encouragement/removing discouragement, etc.) to result in less disparity of outcomes has been the goal.

As a side note, I do not see the connection between the disposable male hypothesis and thus "self earning" (Nor would I expect most people, of any gender identity, to say "Yeah, sure, sign me up to be disposable"). Never mind that the disposable male tends to be more myth (http://ideas.repec.org/p/hhs/iuiwop/0913.html) when applied to men as a whole group in my opinion. Being viewed as a disposable human is more specific to class and social hierarchy then it is to uniquely being male. Soldiers being more of an exception due to also being heavily coded as a male (but let's not forget the huge number of camp followers and support structures of armies, or that most soldiers tended to also be poor or much lower in the social hierarchy when you got to levies). Being poor or a person of color/minority status is not coded as male and throughout history has been treated as disposable and in more areas then just military conflict.


Social Justice Feminism wants to do away with the 'games' entirely, while ignoring that many people, men and women alike, prefer them for better or worse, and demonize and dismiss any opinion supporting the game: Men are dismissed as supporting it because they're the "winners", and women who enjoy it are treated as incapable of seeing the damage they're doing to themselves (Damage as defined by the feminists) and in need of re-education to conform to the viewpoint of those who 'know what's best for them".

I don't know where you are getting the idea that social justice feminism wants to destroy all the things. Like I said early, equalizing the playing field is the goal. For instance, many feminists reproduce aspects of traditional gender roles because they, as individuals, like some of those aspects. Such as dressing in a way that is coded 'feminine' for example. As no one here has said competition should be removed. Pointing out that competition can result in toxic outcomes, and that there are plenty of factors that force men into those unwanted positions is not an attack. Creating additional outs and reducing social punishment for those who do not conform to a specific role is, again, what a lot of social justice is doing.

[The Oni]

It doesn't take much more than a basic understanding of how empires work to realize that concubines in a place as large as China don't get picked based on prettiness. Or for that most concubines don't achieve great political power the way Cixi did, making appeals to her status as one as the source of her power pretty hollow.

Also, if you use the term "feudal Japan", then it's pretty clear that you haven't studied the complex political and social structures of any given period of pre-Meiji Japanese history or even really recognize the great differences between different periods. And in general, that list suggests the reading of someone without professional training in history, so I'd appreciate if you didn't try to lecture me on the field of scholarship that I have a degree in and is currently finishing up a graduate degree in.


Slow down there, pard'ner. You, Terraoblivion, are an avatar on a message board; I've not got the slightest clue what you do in meatspace until you tell me. No, I don't have "professional training" in history. My degree is in Game Design; that doesn't mean I get uppity when "amateurs" write up homebrewed settings without having studied the complex algorithms of game flow for three years and $50,000. Kindly get over yourself.

[Astrella]

Though a lot of books have been published emphasing the differences between the two.

"Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus"
really needs a sequel:
"Men Are From Earth, Women Are From Earth, Get Used To It" :smallamused:

Oh god, I hate that book so much. I'll never get how you can have the idea that men and women are two different species if you've ever interacted with people at all.


Well there are certainly differences in thought patterns as produced by hormonal differences and cultural differences. It makes it difficult to be able to recognize how women are going to behave. For example, I will never understand what PMS or pregnancy is like and how that affects thought patterns. I assume there are things that are the opposite for men, but I can't think of any, mostly because I've always thought of things from my own perspective and haven't put myself in somebody else's perspective and then have them put themselves in my perspective, I'm not even sure if that would be possible.

Of course, but the thing is like, hormone levels fluctuate a lot even within genders and have different influences on individuals. And periods and pregnancy are not experiences even all women go through. And gendered differences (and it's really hard to know what is nurture and what is nature with these) express themselves on a population level and say very little about the average man or woman. There's more variety within each gender than there are differences between the population averages. Remember stereotype threat (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stereotype_threat) as well, stereotypes have a tendency to reinforce themselves.

(And honestly, though this is just my personal experience as a trans woman, but being on different hormone levels now with HRT really hasn't had that much of a influence on my thoughts or behaviour. Sure, it's cleared up my headspace a lot and reduced dissonance, but that's just from reducing dysphoria.)

[Morithias]

The most recent female character I've played first showed up to the party as a youthful engineer named Lee. I was very careful to avoid using pronouns at all (which is a lot harder than it sounds), and described the character as being in the standard steampunk engineer type outfit and being lanky and a little scrawny with goggles serving as a sort of headband to hold short-cropped hair back off the face.

Lee is also a shapeshifted silver dragon. Her human form is not meant to be deceptive; she's just quite young and designed her human form to have minimal encumbering features. She responds equally well to being referred to as a boy or as a girl. If somebody actually made a deal over it, she'd be surprised it came up.

As a character, she's mostly obsessed with technology more than anything else. She's not particularly tomboyish in any other respect, and her greed is truly draconic in scope.

If the party ever has to go to a formal event of some sort, she'll actually "dress up" for it, and look properly feminine, because that's what you do when you're dressed up. Then all the decorative bits will be fitting. (Longer hair, more of a figure, dress, etc.) She has thought about this only once or twice, and then only in passing when she thought she was about to be invited to such an event. She wasn't sure if she would go; her airship needed repairs. ("Lee" is actually a mis-spelling of being short for "Sally," which itself is a mis-spelling of a shortening of her full draconic name.)

Strange minds think alike. Either that or you play Princess Maker 4 too, because I often have a reoccurring character in Rosewood who is a Silver dragon named Lee. He's male though.

[AMFV]

Of course, but the thing is like, hormone levels fluctuate a lot even within genders and have different influences on individuals. And periods and pregnancy are not experiences even all women go through. And gendered differences (and it's really hard to know what is nurture and what is nature with these) express themselves on a population level and say very little about the average man or woman. There's more variety within each gender than there are differences between the population averages. Remember stereotype threat (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stereotype_threat) as well, stereotypes have a tendency to reinforce themselves.

(And honestly, though this is just my personal experience as a trans woman, but being on different hormone levels now with HRT really hasn't had that much of a influence on my thoughts or behaviour. Sure, it's cleared up my headspace a lot and reduced dissonance, but that's just from reducing dysphoria.)

I did try to bring up the cultural stuff, which I think may actually play a bigger factor but there really isn't a way to bring that up without talking about stereotypical experiences, or at least stereotypical experiences in my culture.

I was raised as, and embraced a particular cultural role, while the vast majority of women have had a different experience, that may or may not be right or wrong, but I couldn't put myself in the head of somebody with those experiences (at least not genuinely) than most people could understand what PTSD induced flashbacks feel like, I can't even explain it in a way that you'd be able to understand (although that's trauma rather than culture).

You, in fact, likely have a much better place to understand both gender roles than I might, provided that you've experienced both cultural expectations and the differences in cultures. Although I'm not sure if your experiences in a gender role you weren't comfortable with would be as formative for you as it was for me, in fact I would imagine it wouldn't be.

As a side note, if I've said anything offensive, please let me know, since I'm not very knowledgeable about this, I'm mostly trying to speak from my experience which doesn't extend to trans people in any real sense, but I do have experience with certain cultural things, so hopefully I was able to communicate my experiences in a non-offensive way.

[Segev]

Strange minds think alike. Either that or you play Princess Maker 4 too, because I often have a reoccurring character in Rosewood who is a Silver dragon named Lee. He's male though.

Nope, I've never played a Princess Maker game. ^^; I've heard about them, but I didn't know this "Rosewood" place was associated, to give you an idea of how little I know the games.

I went with "Lee" precisely because it's a shortening that works for gender ambiguity of "Sally."

[Water_Bear]

I don't really get where the "I have no clue what a woman thinks like" thing comes from though.


In my, entirely anecdotal, experience; most men know they don't know how women think, while most women think they know how men think.

This is especially true with anyone who takes the time to write about "the X perspective." I think it's a Dunning-Kruger sort of thing personally, but I've never seen a single such article/post that sounded remotely like myself or anyone I've ever met. Even the ones written by psychologists and psychiatrists fall apart pretty quickly.

I like playing female characters personally, even when I'm not DMing; it's an interesting change of pace and some characters just "turn out" as women when you make them. But that's hardly a source of real insight into the female psyche, any more than playing a Fighter helped me with my saber technique.

[Terraoblivion]

Slow down there, pard'ner. You, Terraoblivion, are an avatar on a message board; I've not got the slightest clue what you do in meatspace until you tell me. No, I don't have "professional training" in history. My degree is in Game Design; that doesn't mean I get uppity when "amateurs" write up homebrewed settings without having studied the complex algorithms of game flow for three years and $50,000. Kindly get over yourself.

What I was referring to wasn't that you were talking about history as an amateur, but rather your insistence on lecturing me about a topic you self-admittedly hadn't actually studied in any significant fashion. Including doing so after I stated having put in considerable study in it, as well as showing rather more detailed knowledge about it than you display such as referencing specific events and people related to Empress Dowager Cixi. A quick google or amazon search or actually reading more than a few scattered bits of her wikipedia entry would have revealed her political talent. As well as the fact that her power was mostly located in her latter years.

What you were doing was quite different from someone creating a homebrew setting without professional training and I imagine you'd be rather more cross if some amateur started lecturing you about game design. There is also the obvious difference in that being an amateur at game design doesn't include repeating one of the most enduring of all sexist stereotypes, that of the evil concubine using their sexiness to corrupt men and ruin the government, but what you said does.

[Astrella]

I did try to bring up the cultural stuff, which I think may actually play a bigger factor but there really isn't a way to bring that up without talking about stereotypical experiences, or at least stereotypical experiences in my culture.

I was raised as, and embraced a particular cultural role, while the vast majority of women have had a different experience, that may or may not be right or wrong, but I couldn't put myself in the head of somebody with those experiences (at least not genuinely) than most people could understand what PTSD induced flashbacks feel like, I can't even explain it in a way that you'd be able to understand (although that's trauma rather than culture).

You, in fact, likely have a much better place to understand both gender roles than I might, provided that you've experienced both cultural expectations and the differences in cultures. Although I'm not sure if your experiences in a gender role you weren't comfortable with would be as formative for you as it was for me, in fact I would imagine it wouldn't be.

As a side note, if I've said anything offensive, please let me know, since I'm not very knowledgeable about this, I'm mostly trying to speak from my experience which doesn't extend to trans people in any real sense, but I do have experience with certain cultural things, so hopefully I was able to communicate my experiences in a non-offensive way.

Mhm. Culture does play a big part, but not only gender colours that. Culture varies a lot by region and social group you're part off. And sexuality, wealth, religion, disability, race / ethnicity and countless other things all colour that. Within each gender there's so much variety in experiences that there isn't really a a unified experience of being a man or being a woman.

And yeah, trying to be a guy didn't really work out for me that much. A lot of cultural expectations around masculinity made me very uncomfortable and out of place, but weren't really the drive behind me transitioning, that was primarily the dissonance and dysphoria I felt about my body. And you haven't said anything really offensive, but thank you for being open to being educated about it. :smallsmile:


In my, entirely anecdotal, experience; most men know they don't know how women think, while most women think they know how men think.

This is especially true with anyone who takes the time to write about "the X perspective." I think it's a Dunning-Kruger sort of thing personally, but I've never seen a single such article/post that sounded remotely like myself or anyone I've ever met. Even the ones written by psychologists and psychiatrists fall apart pretty quickly.

I like playing female characters personally, even when I'm not DMing; it's an interesting change of pace and some characters just "turn out" as women when you make them. But that's hardly a source of real insight into the female psyche, any more than playing a Fighter helped me with my saber technique.

Well, that's the thing, men and women are both incredibly diverse groups, so there isn't really a universal "this is how men think and this is how women think". Sure, there's cultural expectations around gender that colour things, but there's so many other variables that aren't gender that also have their influence.

[Terraoblivion]

I like playing female characters personally, even when I'm not DMing; it's an interesting change of pace and some characters just "turn out" as women when you make them. But that's hardly a source of real insight into the female psyche, any more than playing a Fighter helped me with my saber technique.

There is no singular female psyche. There are as many individual ones as there are girls and women and while gender does play a role in shaping people, so does class, ethnicity, religion, political ideology, country of home, personal talents, family relationship, local community, career or just about anything else you could care to mention.

Really, the biggest stumbling block to understanding "women" is to treat us as the inscrutable other who is radically different from yourself. Look at people as individuals and it becomes pretty clear how to understand any given person.

[AMFV]

Oh god, I hate that book so much. I'll never get how you can have the idea that men and women are two different species if you've ever interacted with people at all.



Of course, but the thing is like, hormone levels fluctuate a lot even within genders and have different influences on individuals. And periods and pregnancy are not experiences even all women go through. And gendered differences (and it's really hard to know what is nurture and what is nature with these) express themselves on a population level and say very little about the average man or woman. There's more variety within each gender than there are differences between the population averages. Remember stereotype threat (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stereotype_threat) as well, stereotypes have a tendency to reinforce themselves.

(And honestly, though this is just my personal experience as a trans woman, but being on different hormone levels now with HRT really hasn't had that much of a influence on my thoughts or behaviour. Sure, it's cleared up my headspace a lot and reduced dissonance, but that's just from reducing dysphoria.)


Mhm. Culture does play a big part, but not only gender colours that. Culture varies a lot by region and social group you're part off. And sexuality, wealth, religion, disability, race / ethnicity and countless other things all colour that. Within each gender there's so much variety in experiences that there isn't really a a unified experience of being a man or being a woman.

And yeah, trying to be a guy didn't really work out for me that much. A lot of cultural expectations around masculinity made me very uncomfortable and out of place, but weren't really the drive behind me transitioning, that was primarily the dissonance and dysphoria I felt about my body. And you haven't said anything really offensive, but thank you for being open to being educated about it. :smallsmile:

I agree, at least with the factors other than gender. I wouldn't know what it's like to be an African American for much the same reasons. It's just not something I have an understanding of.

On a less off-topic note, that's probably one of the best ways to address sexism in roleplaying, in that it allows you to think in perspectives you otherwise might not be inclined to think in. So this is possibly a way that sexism or other prejudices might be addressed or at least examined. Although it might not be possible to do it in any way that is really the same as reality at least it could improve on learning to think from different perspectives.

[Themrys]

...Because I'm a male? My voice is male (with which I make the NPC speak) and my thought process is male too. Honestly I don't have THE FAINTEST IDEA how a woman would think, and respond in some complex situation. When they catch an NPC it's not to ask them the time of the day and if they pull weird crap, I have no idea how to give a half realistic reaction from a woman's point of view.

I know how I would react and it makes easy for me to give some half realistic male behaviour.

Your voice is still male when you play NPCs that need to be female.

And really, it is not so hard to imagine how a woman would react. It's even easier in a setting where women aren't oppressed. (That's why I asked. If you play in a setting where women are oppressed, I can understand why you would need time to think about a realistic reaction)

There are only so many ways how you can react to something, and they tend to be completely different for individual people.

Of course you do not know how other people think. That's impossible to know. You can only see how they act, and ask why, and then, you usually get a train of thought you can relate to.


Your players really expect that your voice matches the NPC when using direct speech? That seems needlessly difficult. I don't even remember my parents doing that when reading books to me.

[The Oni]

What you were doing was quite different from someone creathing a homebrew setting without professional training and I imagine you'd be rather more cross if some amateur started lecturing you about game design. There is also the obvious difference in that being an amateur at game design doesn't include repeating one of the most enduring of all sexist stereotypes, that of the evil concubine using their sexiness to corrupt men and ruin the government, but what you said does.

I'm not lecturing, and I never said that Cixi ruined the government. That appears to be a political construction of the Chinese government that came after her trying to pin the country's troubles on an easy scapegoat (a bit like politics today, welli'llbedamned) and it just happened to be "backed up" because it fit with a narrative people expected in turn-of-the-century China.

My only point is that you seemed to be under the impression that my source was a "quick glance at Wikipedia" and therefore dismissed the commentary out of hand. I checked a couple of different sources, as I always do when Wikipedia is involved, to verify that nobody's gone in and tried to play Ministry of Truth with the pages.

[Segev]

Themrys, do you believe women to be oppressed in the real world Western culture from which you (presumably) come?

Assuming you are a woman (and please correct me if I'm wrong in that assumption; as I type this I cannot recall if your profile is marked for gender), do you believe YOU are oppressed?

If the answer to that last one is "yes," do you imagine then that you have a hard time thinking "like a man" to portray one, since men are not - I assume, to your mindset - oppressed?

If the answer is that "no," you do not believe yourself to be oppressed, does that mean you believe you can think like a man all the better because of this?


Are there any unexamined assumptions I might be making in these questions that make them hard to answer accurately? If so, please elaborate on them.

[Terraoblivion]

I'm not lecturing, and I never said that Cixi ruined the government. That appears to be a political construction of the Chinese government that came after her trying to pin the country's troubles on an easy scapegoat (a bit like politics today, welli'llbedamned) and it just happened to be "backed up" because it fit with a narrative people expected in turn-of-the-century China.

So, let me get this straight, you pick one of the most despised rulers of Chinese history and declare her rise to power was due to being a sexy concubine and you do it without in any way referencing or reinforcing the idea of evil concubines using sex to ruin governments? I'm sorry, I have a hard time believing that it was completely by accident and in no way reflects any thoughts or beliefs you might have, whether consciously or unconsciously.

[AgentofHellfire]

What I was referring to wasn't that you were talking about history as an amateur, but rather your insistence on lecturing me about a topic you self-admittedly hadn't actually studied in any significant fashion. Including doing so after I stated having put in considerable study in it, as well as showing rather more detailed knowledge about it than you display such as referencing specific events and people related to Empress Dowager Cixi. A quick google or amazon search or actually reading more than a few scattered bits of her wikipedia entry would have revealed her political talent. As well as the fact that her power was mostly located in her latter years.

So, ah...unfortunately, I'm barred by my computer from viewing the whole debate, but I have to ask: Exactly how does any commentary on her political talent/power in later years contradict the idea of using seduction as a political tool?


There is also the obvious difference in that being an amateur at game design doesn't include repeating one of the most enduring of all sexist stereotypes, that of the evil concubine using their sexiness to corrupt men and ruin the government, but what you said does.

Having a single character that fills it isn't really equivalent to supporting it. Especially if you counterbalance it a lot.

[Segev]

So, let me get this straight, you pick one of the most despised rulers of Chinese history and declare her rise to power was due to being a sexy concubine and you do it without in any way referencing or reinforcing the idea of evil concubines using sex to ruin governments? I'm sorry, I have a hard time believing that it was completely by accident and in no way reflects any thoughts or beliefs you might have, whether consciously or unconsciously.

Her method of rise to power need not be directly correlated to how good she was at ruling nor to her popularity as a ruler, at her time or historically. You are the one conflating the two.

It may be an easy conflation to make, but until you brought it up, I had no idea that this was even potentially a connection. (I've never heard of the figure in question before this thread.)

"So-and-so is an example of somebody doing something in this fashion." "So! You hate people like that because so-and-so is an example of a reviled person! How dare you!?"

Nowhere did the original speaker mention her being reviled or even bad. Just that she is an example of something under discussion.