I am just not fond of the idea that entertainment...or anything...is apolitical.
Well entertainment is a good medium to promote a political message and it has been used that way for a long time so no I don't agree with that either, but there are different kinds of media that serve different purposes. People are always going to want to create entertainment that is just there to entertain or just something that they wanted to make that happens to not be about what some might want it to be without. My point is that there is nothing wrong with that.
Just because creators set out to make something primarily meant for entertainment does not mean it does not send messages about things like sexuality or race or a billion other things. Whether they want it to (or intended it to) isn't really relevant - it does.
That's a very vague argument that is very convenient for you and your argument. It doesn't mean anything unless it goes into specifics and I don't see it as an argument against certain forms of media unless you can at least indicate a negative effect these kinds of media has on people and or their views about these issues.
I want to stress that entertainment IS still primarily entertainment - I'm not proposing some sort of checklist that everything should have to go through. Gaider's talked about this at his GDC talk - no one piece of media can be everything to everybody, and if it tried, it would probably feel incredibly artificial. Of course writers are gonna tell the stories they want to tell. All I'm saying is that when we tell / create those stories, discussions and considerations about what you're saying to your audience about very real social problems and groups not fall off the table because they do say something. Telling story after story that includes absolutely no queer characters, to just name one example, is not probably sending a very great message about those characters. It's erasing them.
This is an argument about media as a whole. It doesn't really address individual pieces of media or even certain forms of media like games. Most games are not really that much about story and even the ones that are have other things to consider.
Stories are told about queer people and if you want more by all means express that opinion, or tell them yourself.
We're also looking at Dorian as if being gay is his identity. It's not his whole identity. He's a character and there's more to him than being gay.
The fact that he's seen as being stereotypical or "the gay character," doesn't do the writing team justice. His personality is his personality. Whether that be on the more stereotypical side or not. The character was written as he is.
I think Word of Gaider came down on Maevaris as "Not in DA:I, character was created too late to be included this time, but not ruled out for future games".
Dont really care... i will just accept it as it is. Hell i will romance him too after i finish my main playtrough and in each one i will romance only 1.
Dont see what the fuss about Dorian being gay is about.... to me it looks like some thickheaded people whining and cant accept it.
In Southeast Asia, lesbians are tolerated and accepted more than gays. You have laws in this region, in nations like Malaysian and Singapore where if you are a gay male, you can fined or imprisoned or caned whereas if you are a lesbian, its okay.
Interesting. Though my point was that partly that it is hard to quantify intolerance, and things can be difficult in different ways for different people.
A small part of me would really enjoy if DA:I has full on sex scenes ala Witcher 2 style and there's a huge media outrage about gay sex scenes .
A big part of me would feel bad about about the negative attention Bioware would be getting, though it's fun to think about it .Among the huuuge amounts of straight female objectification in all sorts of entertainment media, a gay sex scene would be fun on so many levels.
Why are people talking like Sera got no hate for being lesbian? i remember people hating on her alot when it was announced, some people saying she should "put some effort" into getting together with a male PC & some going as far as cancelling their pre-orders, accusing BW of hating straight males just cos 1 female character was gated from straight male PC's
Okay, need to break this apart a bit. It is true that being a feminine guy or butch lesbian and so on is not wrong or a problem, and those types of characters need representation. However, it's dangerous to start claiming that they get more abuse than others; it would probably be more accurate to say that they receive abuse that others don't get, but that doesn't mean a feminine lesbian, for instance, doesn't suffer from homophobia or sexism.
Also, I'll quote Chimamanda Adichie: "The problem with a stereotype is not that it is wrong, but that it is incomplete." Those stereotypes aren't wrong, per se, but there's something very wrong if that's the majority of what we're getting all of the time. We need balance and variety is basically what I'm saying.
Yeah that part was poorly worded, I completely agree with you. I guess it just bothers me when people act like camp gay men/butch lesbians are giving masculine gay men/feminine lesbians a bad image. But yeah I get what your saying as we experience homophobia in different ways.
I'm not the most masculine guy but people always assume I'm straight (which now makes me really uncomfortable) and that can be pretty irritating having to come out to people all the time, as well as a few homophobic comments ive gotten from people after coming out.
It's definitely preferable that both types of gay people are represented! Personally I hope Dorian fits somewhere in the middle of feminity/masculinity.
Why are people talking like Sera got no hate for being lesbian? i remember people hating on her alot when it was announced, some people saying she should "put some effort" into getting together with a male PC & some going as far as cancelling their pre-orders, accusing BW of hating straight males just cos 1 female character was gated from straight male PC's
Well the issue with Sera is slightly different. People wanted to romance Sera with male PC's so they didn't like the options they were left with. People who hate on Dorian being gay is people who don't want gay characters in the game. So it's not about disapoinment, it's about game having content you don't like about.
That's a very vague argument that is very convenient for you and your argument. It doesn't mean anything unless it goes into specifics and I don't see it as an argument against certain forms of media unless you can at least indicate a negative effect these kinds of media has on people and or their views about these issues.
This is an argument about media as a whole. It doesn't really address individual pieces of media or even certain forms of media like games. Most games are not really that much about story and even the ones that are have other things to consider.
Stories are told about queer people and if you want more by all means express that opinion, or tell them yourself.
I am making an argument about media as a whole. Media can be both entertaining and contain messages about social issues, but many people act like it's either / or. Now, I'm not really sure that I was attempting to argue against certain forms of media; I'm arguing against media that does not make at least some effort to be inclusive.
If you're looking for a point-by-point indication of exactly how forms of media affect real-world views, then I'm not going to provide that. I don't have that information, and I think trying to find it would be largely futile because we're far more complicated than that. If we just parroted everything we saw on tv, for instance, our society would have burned down a long time ago.
I guess I'll talk about... (rolls d6)...sexism.
On its own, no one thing is going to make somebody sexist as if they were struck by a magical spell. But combined, everything has a cumulative effect upon them that shapes their world views.
If you're born biologically male, you grow up in a world where:
-The majority of important characters in all media (particularly media marketed directly at you) are male
-Phrases like "Man up" and "Stop being a P$&#*" are leveled against you and associate anything girly/female with bad or weak
-Your police officers, doctors, school principals (admittedly less teachers) are likely all male
-You're discouraged from playing or interacting with girls through gender segregation
-You play video games that are predominantly male-oriented and feature male characers; female characters are usually weak, dependent on you, or there just for sex/decoration
-Phrases like "Boys will be boys" are used to justify bad behavior (like bullying, particularly bullying a girl)
-If you do anything girly (show emotions other than anger/aggression'and maybe happiness), you are made fun of and ostracized
-You're made fun of if you aren't typically good looking (aka you are considered less powerful and men are supposed to be powerful - fat people aren't powerful). Even jokes about not being able to see your genitalia are feminizing and misogynistic
-No one will discourage you from going into technical/scientific fields like girls are
-Your good grades probably aren't seen as shocking; i.e. no one will say, "You did great on your Science project...for a boy." Sounds silly, right?
-You won't have people scrutinizing the way you dress with anywhere near the attention that girls get
-Girls and women (straight ones) will probably not cat-call and make you feel like a piece of meat ()
-Male is the default setting and female is a deviation - even 'fe' is added onto 'male' just like Actor and Actress, Tempter and Temptress, and some made up jokes like in Infamous Second Son ("Our Sniper is a Sniperette"). In other words, men get to be just themselves, but females are usually marked as female and are a derivation from the base male form.
I could go on because there's lots to talk about. Now, individual circumstances will change lots of this stuff on an individual scale, but most boys and men will have experienced at least some of these things. Does any one of these things make someone a sexist? No. But over years and years of continued exposure, all of this stuff, and more, teaches us sexism. Which is why it's challenging, but possible and necessary, to un-teach it.
Games and media are a big part of that. I guess I can go into individual games if you want, but I don't really feel it's necessary. Again, I'm talking about the system, not particular instances. Anita Sarkeesian, for instance, uses Dragon Age: Origins in her video about Women as Background Decoration in illustrating how violence against women and sexual assault are used to create a mood and are basically set dressing (Shianni in the City Elf Origin). Now, I don't have an issue with that because she's simply pointing out a trend in how sexual assault is used. Were she actually analyzing Dragon Age; Origins, she would probably give a much more nuanced and deep look at the whole game, other characters, and how Shianni is at the end of the game (which was awesome to see given how survivors are usually just tragic figures) just to name a few. She isn't saying stories like that are off-limits or bad, only that they exist within a larger context of games that all do that (and most of them don't handle it as well as Dragon Age did).
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I'm gonna get a lot of "I don't care that he's gay" 's on here, which is good. But then people say that Bioware is either
A. Pandering to the LGBT Community
or
B. Trying to be "social justice clowns".
Is there a reason people complain about Dorian being gay and not Sera? It just seems like Bioware mentions it once, the Media mention it a lot, and then people complain about things being shoved down their throat. Why?
Well, people complained about Sera being gay too so it isn't just Dorian. And people have complained about Blackwall, Cassandra, Cullen and Solas being straight. And Cullen and Solas being race-gated.
Why are people talking like Sera got no hate for being lesbian? i remember people hating on her alot when it was announced, some people saying she should "put some effort" into getting together with a male PC & some going as far as cancelling their pre-orders, accusing BW of hating straight males just cos 1 female character was gated from straight male PC's
Exactly. Dorian might be getting hate for being gay, but Sera did too, it was simply expressed in a different way. That way generally being "argh, why are there women who don't want to have sex with my male character!" They might be more accepting of two women having sex (I don't remember Isabela & Merrill getting any flak for being bi compared to Fenris and especially Anders), but when it comes to two women in a relationship that excludes them? Then the same hate comes out.
Not refering to the guys who were simply disappointed she wasn't available, of course. I'm refering to the ones who spewed all sorts of hate onto Sera, lesbians, women in general, and whoever else simply because she is gay.
Exactly. Dorian might be getting hate for being gay, but Sera did too, it was simply expressed in a different way. That way generally being "argh, why are there women who don't want to have sex with my male character!" They might be more accepting of two women having sex (I don't remember Isabela & Merrill getting any flak for being bi compared to Fenris and especially Anders), but when it comes to two women in a relationship that excludes them? Then the same hate comes out.
Not refering to the guys who were simply disappointed she wasn't available, of course. I'm refering to the ones who spewed all sorts of hate onto Sera, lesbians, women in general, and whoever else simply because she is gay.
Merrill did get some hate for being bisexual, it seemed mostly cos she wasn't the typical "bi person who f**ks anyone" stereotype so she was "obviously" not "realistic". I really hate the "realism" argument, used to attack bi people
It's the same reasoning why the cortez sex scene on youtube has way more dislikes than the traynor shower scene; homophobes are hypocrites through and through most of the time.
Ugh the shower scene, that was bloody awful. No offence to Bioware or lesbians, but that scene was a total cheese-fest with a side of stupid, I mean who the hell faffs about in the shower with your underoos still on? My point being that it was bad, and that Cortez was treated unfairly, cuz homophobes n' stuff.
I did loathe seeing the phrase "gay agenda" brought up time + again in that outcry over Dorian's sexuality, even though it is the most predictable of homophobe catch phrases...I actually remember seeing someone on another forum say something along the lines of "if we have to sacrifice one follower in this game, I know who I'm gonna choose to kill"........................+ he was praised for saying that "sigh"
I can't remember if there was a similar response to the Iron Bull being pansexual, but I guess if there was, it would be "blah blah blah forcing their agenda into our games blah blah"
I did loathe seeing the phrase "gay agenda" brought up time + again in that outcry over Dorian's sexuality, even though it is the most predictable of homophobe catch phrases...I actually remember seeing someone on another forum say something along the lines of "if we have to sacrifice one follower in this game, I know who I'm gonna choose to kill"........................+ he was praised for saying that "sigh"
I can't remember if there was a similar response to the Iron Bull being pansexual, but I guess if there was, it would be "blah blah blah forcing their agenda into our games blah blah"
Whoa, this guy saw something offensive and wrong on the internet? hold the ****** phone guys.
Stop acting as if the internet represents real life. I could go on any website and make any comment I like about anything I wanted. That wouldn't matter. If I made a petition saying "I don't want homosexuals in my games as they disgust me and are bad for my kids" on change.org, and it got 10k signatures, then yes, you would be entitled to using generalization. But that hasn't, and will not happen, so just stop.
I'm honestly surprised this thread hasn't been deleted already. All this topic does is bring 'homophobes' and 'SJWs' to the table and people who want to have a debate are hamfisted into those two categories.
Whoa, this guy saw something offensive and wrong on the internet? hold the ****** phone guys.
Stop acting as if the internet represents real life. I could go on any website and make any comment I like about anything I wanted. That wouldn't matter. If I made a petition saying "I don't want homosexuals in my games as they disgust me and are bad for my kids" on change.org, and it got 10k signatures, then yes, you would be entitled to using generalization. But that hasn't, and will not happen, so just stop.
I'm honestly surprised this thread hasn't been deleted already. All this topic does is bring 'homophobes' and 'SJWs' to the table and people who want to have a debate are hamfisted into those two categories.
Just because bad things are said on the internet all the time doesn't mean we shouldn't cry out against them all the time.We absolutely should.
Offensive comments and negative messages should be something to frown upon, in fact we must encourage people to speak out against them.
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I am making an argument about media as a whole. Media can be both entertaining and contain messages about social issues, but many people act like it's either / or. Now, I'm not really sure that I was attempting to argue against certain forms of media; I'm arguing against media that does not make at least some effort to be inclusive.
This is all very evasive, you are arguing against all media that does not at least try to be inclusive so you are arguing against specific forms of media or specific games/ films/ comics that are not inclusive enough because you believe they send un-inclusive messages to the public. My point is this argument ends there, you can go on and on about what the media does and doesn't say about society but that doesn't really mean anything. What is the effect of these messages? How can you show that this effect is in fact caused by media messages? If you can't answer these questions then you aren't really saying anything objective, it's just how you feel about the media.
If you're looking for a point-by-point indication of exactly how forms of media affect real-world views, then I'm not going to provide that. I don't have that information, and I think trying to find it would be largely futile because we're far more complicated than that. If we just parroted everything we saw on tv, for instance, our society would have burned down a long time ago.
Yes, it's very complicated so a lot of points made about such things are incredibly vague and generally useless, yet people make them all the time and you keep using these kinds of arguments. Some vague claim about how things may or may not be is not useful.
On its own, no one thing is going to make somebody sexist as if they were struck by a magical spell. But combined, everything has a cumulative effect upon them that shapes their world views.
But does it really? If it does, how mush so? Is media stronger or weaker than other factors? Everything has an effect on me but most of these effects are probably not all that substantial and I have no way of knowing for sure which effects were the most important.
Now, individual circumstances will change lots of this stuff on an individual scale, but most boys and men will have experienced at least some of these things. Does any one of these things make someone a sexist? No. But over years and years of continued exposure, all of this stuff, and more, teaches us sexism. Which is why it's challenging, but possible and necessary, to un-teach it.
More vague arguments about how media kinda sorta makes people sexist but you can't prove any of it and you don't have to.
I am not saying media does not teach us to be sexist but you are trying to cure a problem that you haven't even shown to be a problem, you don't know what effect "all this stuff" has.
Anita Sarkeesian
is a good example of someone who makes very vague points about subjects she doesn't seem to understand. No I am not talking about the "she misrepresents the games things". She obviously doesn't understand many of the philosophical concepts she brings up, she's not a scholar or an expert and if she is where you are getting your info from then you have a problem.
She isn't saying stories like that are off-limits or bad, only that they exist within a larger context of games that all do that (and most of them don't handle it as well as Dragon Age did).
She argues that the very existence of a sexualised female background character who can be killed is "implicit encouragement" for the player to kill them. Do you really think that she thinks this is not bad and or that it should not be off limits?
What we can take from her series is that it is very easy to fall victim to conformation bias when you are not looking at things objectively. Her series could have been interesting if she was not so obviously just trying to prove conclusions she has already made.
Ugh the shower scene, that was bloody awful. No offence to Bioware or lesbians, but that scene was a total cheese-fest with a side of stupid, I mean who the hell faffs about in the shower with your underoos still on? My point being that it was bad, and that Cortez was treated unfairly, cuz homophobes n' stuff.
well I liked the shower scene . beside..even Javik and Grunt end up in the shower (During Citadel DLC) with their armor on..and ALONE no less .
She argues that the very existence of a sexualised female background character who can be killed is "implicit encouragement" for the player to kill them. Do you really think that she thinks this is not bad and or that it should not be off limits?
What we can take from her series is that it is very easy to fall victim to conformation bias when you are not looking at things objectively. Her series could have been interesting if she was not so obviously just trying to prove conclusions she has already made.
What we can actually take away from her series is that there are incredibly large numbers of unstable belligerent sexists who will repeatedly issue IRL death and rape threats to a woman who makes a relatively simplistic and poor argument about their hobby.
Her work doesn't uncover sexism in games, IMO, it uncovers a worrying and virulent form of sexism in gamers.
What we can actually take away from her series is that there are incredibly large numbers of unstable belligerent sexists who will repeatedly issue IRL death and rape threats to a woman who makes a relatively simplistic and poor argument about their hobby.
Her work doesn't uncover sexism in games, IMO, it uncovers a worrying and virulent form of sexism in gamers.
My perception of it is that this is the the partly truth.
The other part is that they're just pushing her buttons."Ha you dislike rape?Hahaha I will rape you."It's like small children in kindergarden really."You dislike me kicking your toy"Hahaha I will kick your toy".It's not about her being a woman(at least a part of it), it's about stupid people on the internet pushing the buttons on the internet of a person they dislike.
It's like cursing Jesus in the comments in a christian video or Muhammed in a muslim video.It's because people on the internet act immature and think they're boss when they offend someone.
Though this discussion is maybe off-topic in regards to the thread?
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