1942 réponses à ce sujet

[Gothfather]

I don't want to be offended. Who wants to be offended? I'm actually a super chill person.  I don't care if my friends understand everything about me, or if they get confused. That's life, and I'm always happy to explain if they want, but I also don't need them to understand. I don't need them to not make mistakes. But if they are purposefully mislabeling me because they're prioritizing their confusion over my certainty about myself....then that's really self-obsessed, especially given how clear I make it that I do not want to be referred to as such. 

 

I feel like people get tripped on the "understanding" part and just never get to the acceptance. I mean, here in this thread, it's sort of an environment that fosters a more abstract conversation, but...if you have a friend who comes out as anything: lesbian, bi, gay, pan, trans, ace, demi etc....and you can't go "Okay" unless you understand it perfectly & know it satisfies whatever x,y,z criteria you have for something being "legit"....I don't know, that doesn't sound like you're being a great friend. Which happens, people make mistakes, but I'm not going to tolerate it over a long period of time from someone who is supposed to be part of my support group, and I think that's perfectly reasonable. If there's someone who is genuinely not bothered by it, then that's great for them! They don't *need* to be upset if they aren't upset. I wouldn't assume, though, that just because someone isn't saying that it bothers them, that they're fine. People, especially those struggling with their identity, do not generally enjoy making themselves vulnerable. 

 

You're right, these things can be a struggle to convey and talk about.That doesn't mean it's not worth it to try, and it absolutely doesn't mean that the response to "I don't understand" should be "therefore I shall ignore it/deny it." 

The only way i can process and explain this is to use my own frame of reference...

 

I am a goth, you ever try to explain the difference between goth and emo? There are some people (not many) that simply can't view me as anything but emo because within their own internal frames of reference and their own internal understanding of things they don't see a difference and they are more familiar with emos then goths. And because their understanding of the world is a construct they have created over years its not as simple as relabeling me. It not that they aren't good people, they are rude, they are unsupportive, they simply are incapable of making the mental leap, at least at the current time.

 

I am just not willing to resign this as a character flaw in someone when it seems to be near universal to some degree, and its not malicious in intent. I could be wrong it might be willful ignorance but when i see members of the LGBT community doing the same thing, i tend to give them the benifit of the doubt, especially when its not isolated to a single outlier.

 

This is a digression of the thread. I put my 2 cents worth in. I gave an idea how you might be able to make the romance work within the mechanics of story telling which got some support by people as well as the OP. I don't want to hijack the thread and make it sound like i am telling people how they should feel.

[RevilFox]

The only way i can process and explain this is to use my own frame of reference...

 

I am a goth, you ever try to explain the difference between goth and emo? 

That's easy, a goth is someone who feels that life is unfair because of legitimate life issues. An emo is someone who feels that life is unfair because their parents bought them the wrong color sports car.

 

 

Do I win?

[Grieving Natashina]

Ah, I remember the days when when Emo wasn't a term and instead that kind of group/look had a different name.  Goths here used to call them Baby Bats.  

[Lukas Trevelyan]

Well I'm no demisexual but I understand and respect the ideal and even slightly relate to it. I say yes. 

[berrieh]

You seem to be trying to deny the validity of my experience, but I can assure you that it is every bit as real and valid for me as yours is for you.

I'd still like to know just exactly what it was about her earlier dialogues that was so undeniably flirtatious to you. Or how / where you draw that line that says, "this isn't friendship, it's sexual attraction."

 

I'm not denying your experience, but rather saying any experience to the contrary proves Leliana is not programmed as demisexual since that has nothing to do with player experience. I don't think your individual experience has anything to do with Leliana's portrayal as a whole. If she flirts with any PC early and readily, she is not demonstrating the pattern laid out in the OP here. As to why I felt she was easy to flirt with me, tone was a lot of it, though content was there. Her relationship (desire to flirt, kiss, etc) was also not significantly gated by experiences together or a growing relationship in any way - only SEX with her was. (I typed out a whole post with all the lines of banter that seem to paint Leliana as no stranger to flirting, attraction, sexuality, etc. But I decided against fussing the thread further. I do not think she properly stands as the representation the OP was asking for or fits the OP. I think it seems to be a very important distinction between choosing to wait for sex and not experiencing primary attraction, and I think Leliana has been selected merely because of the former, but you can think what you will.) 

[Grieving Natashina]

I'm out of likes, so I'll just keep this open for later.  <copies tab>

[Sporothrix]

Oh, absolutely. I don't think they should have to change their word-- people just need to understand that because the etymology of the terms is different, you can't say that "demisexual" and "homosexual" are the same type/category of word. "Demisexual" implies a lot about the way a person experiences attraction (but not the sex/gender of the person that attraction is directed to), "******/hetero/bisexual" only tells you WHO a person is attracted to, but not necessarily HOW they experience that attraction OR how they act on it.

 

I think that's why it's valuable to realize that most people will need at least two labels to fully explain their sexual/romantic identies. If you tell me you're "demisexual", I have no idea whether or not that means I might have a chance at a relationship with you because you might not be into dudes at all, even IF you got to know me really well first. 

 

TL;DR "******/hetero/bisexual" and "demisexual" do NOT have to be mutually exclusive IDs. Actually, neither are "gay/straight" and "asexual/demisexual". I know a couple of people who ID as both gay and asexual as well as people who consider themselves straight and asexual because they are only interested in being part of a m/f couple, even if sex isn't part of it. 

 

People can mean by the same word many different things, I've even met some women who didn't think "lesbian" and "bisexual" are mutually exclusive (one contestant in Australian Big Brother said that she's lesbian when she's with woman and bisexual when she's with man).

 

There is no standardized definition of sexual orientation, and if I'm not mistaken "demisexuality" term isn't yet recognized by the world of science, but interestingly exactly such pattern has been described for example in Lisa M. Diamond's longitudinal research on a group of sexual minority women.

 

Diamond called them "people with person-based attractions" though, and she has quite rigid understanding of what sexual orientation is. For her, it's only what has been called here "primary attraction", and exclusively in its sexual aspect (romantic feelings are run by separated brain circuits and there are solid evidences that preferences in that area aren't really biologically hardwired, unlike sexual ones). From the studies on animals she borrowed the term "proceptivity" for it, meaning here general motivation to have sex with people of desired gender, sexual arousal caused by sex characteristics (female or/and male body parts), etc.

 

Aside from orientation, there is ability to develop sexual attraction to specific person usually in response to falling in love, and Diamond called it as "fluidity potential', which doesn't appear in all people. That was the case of some people in her research - that they were, aside from one "exception", gay or straight and weren't attracted to any other member of the "wrong" gender.

Those studies were on women, but if I'm not mistaken it happened as well for example to Jon Moss from Culture Club, who claims he's straight and Boy George was the only guy he loved and was into.

 

So, people with person based attraction when it comes to their sexual orientation in Diamond's understanding are asexual, but have "fluidity potential". Meanwhile, demisexuality is understood as separate from asexuality sexual orientation. And a guy who was with a man, even if aside from it he's only into women in general and particular, wouldn't be considered straight. But it shows lack of agreement on the basic nomenclature.

[Vanth]

Wouldn't it be better if we all just stopped trying to define ourselves by our sexual desires? I believe I am more than that and feel that labelling myself as 'straight', 'gay', 'asexual' or whatever does disservice to who I am as a complete person. 

[carlo angelo]

Wouldn't it be better if we all just stopped trying to define ourselves by our sexual desires? I believe I am more than that and feel that labelling myself as 'straight', 'gay', 'asexual' or whatever does disservice to who I am as a complete person. 

Because everyone should be like you in terms of how they perceive their sexual identity. Sure.

 

These people aren't stupid, they get that their sexuality makes up a part of who they are, but the fact is that in mainstream society, that's a part of them that gets disparaged and less represented if they're not among the majority. And so a lot of them go through some time in their life thinking that there's something wrong with them, or that they'll never fit in, or they'll go about pretending something that they're not. The whole point of this thread and many others like it is that sexual orientation and identity is not the be-all-end-all for characters and characters who are not heterosexual or cisgendered can still be portrayed as well-written and humanised people.

[Pasquale1234]

I'm not denying your experience, but rather saying any experience to the contrary proves Leliana is not programmed as demisexual since that has nothing to do with player experience.

Already covered that here
 

Sorry, but as I stated in my original post, I think that is highly subject to interpretation.
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Ultimately, what we think we observe in the behaviors of others is very much subject to interpretation.
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And no, I'm not trying to suggest that Leliana was intentionally written to be demisexual - only that she can be interpreted as such. I don't know whether authorial intent (WOG) should carry that much weight.

As to why I felt she was easy to flirt with me, tone was a lot of it, though content was there.

I see.

I don't happen to think that bard stories, her opinions about the Maker, explanations of escaping to the chantry to hide, what it means to be a bard in Orlais, etc. are flirtatious... but you apparently do, therefore I'm wrong.
 

Her relationship (desire to flirt, kiss, etc) was also not significantly gated by experiences together or a growing relationship in any way - only SEX with her was.

It was IME.
 

I do not think she properly stands as the representation the OP was asking for or fits the OP.

I never intended to suggest that she was.
 

I think it seems to be a very important distinction between choosing to wait for sex and not experiencing primary attraction, and I think Leliana has been selected merely because of the former, but you can think what you will.)

I also mentioned that in my very first post in this topic here:
 

It seems to me that in order to really capture the essence of what it means to be demisexual - and demonstrate it clearly in a fictional character - you would have to make some declarations that delineate between expressions of affection and expressions of sexual desire. I honestly don't know how you could accomplish that, short of labeling and defining everything. Anything else would likely be interpreted as a character who may feel sexual desire but does not act on it until the relationship reaches a certain point.

And this comes all the way back to assumptions people make about others. You have to assume that Leliana - a known bard with the ability to be manipulative - feels sexual attraction when she is not in love in order to write her off as a potential demisexual. Since I don't presume to know what others are feeling, I'm not willing to do that.

Some recent posts in this thread talk about a bisexual assumed to be a lesbian when dating a woman, and straight when dating a man - yet she is a self-proclaimed bisexual regardless of who she is dating.

I've argued with people who assume that Aveline is straight because we see her married to Ser Wesley and then Ser Donnic - but what we know about her does not preclude her being bisexual, pansexual, or perhaps something else. Maybe Aveline is demisexual.

The assumptions that people are apparently so very willing to make about others makes it extremely challenging for Bioware to fulfill the OP's request.

[veeia]

Wouldn't it be better if we all just stopped trying to define ourselves by our sexual desires? I believe I am more than that and feel that labelling myself as 'straight', 'gay', 'asexual' or whatever does disservice to who I am as a complete person.

Everyone is more than any label, we all contain multitudes. If you yourself don't feel any need for a label, then don't use one!

For me the value of these words is mostly in how they provide alternative ways of thinking about sexuality or gender. Things like heterosexuality, or cis gendered are basically the "default" assumption, which is alienating for people who don't fit into them. Having different terms to define themselves in relation to something, rather than opposition is validating and includes, rather than excludes.

Language is confining, and so one of the ways we combat that is by expanding it. It will never be enough, of course, and that's why I think acceptance of someone as a whole person is more important than being able to describe exactly what their label means, or needing to know one if they don't provide it.

[DeN DarK]

I think any romancable NPC character with long story of romance before sex may count as demisexual. In that regard i'm want to have more such characters. For game it is only better.

[Hanako Ikezawa]

Wow, I missed a lot yesterday. Luckily it seems that the topics seem to have been answered. 

 

I would be open to seeing this kind of romance in game. I also wanted to thank OP Kallen for teaching me something new today. I had not heard the term "Demisexual" before. 

Blessings

You are very welcome.

 

 

I thought the op was asking for sex with demons...

No need. We already could in past games. The Desire Demon possessing Connor(only if you are a mage) and Anders if you think of Justice as a demon Vengeance. 

 

I honestly can't tell if these conversations are good, or derailing, haha. I hope we can return to the larger topic though, because I think its a good one and we had some good discussions about it earlier, before the thread became about the validity of the label.

To change pace a little, how about people give ideas of characters they would like to see with this. And it doesn't have to just be Dragon Age. Character ideas for Mass Effect are fine too. 

[Elissiaro]

To change pace a little, how about people give ideas of characters they would like to see with this. And it doesn't have to just be Dragon Age. Character ideas for Mass Effect are fine too. 

 

Hmm... In mass effect I want a cute, shy, maybe inexperienced Drell male... Who isn't dying.

And in Dragon age I want a fun, friendly and completely oblivious to flirting but has been in at least one relationship before, Dwarven woman.

Both demi-bi, because reasons.

[veeia]

I'm not demi, so tell me if you wouldn't like it, but I think it'd be fun to have one of those morally ambiguous rogues be demi. Just because someone has fluid allegiances doesn't mean their sexuality and romantic preferences aren't without preferences or conditions.

[Hanako Ikezawa]

For Mass Effect characters, I wonder if it would be easier to show it if the character was of the more sexual races, like the Asari or Krogan. Since their races survive off of sexuality, it would be a stark contrast if there was an Asari commando or Krogan battle-maiden or someone who was demisexual. 

[dlux]

Companions in Bioware's games will only romance resp. have sex with your PC after a emotional bonding. Leliana, for example, could be demisexual, because she will only engage in a romantic encounter after she has developed strong emotions for your character.

 

That said, why do you think it is important to have NPCs explicitly identify themselves as demisexual? I personally don't think a label is necessary, because you can roleplay however you like in your world. In my Origins playthroughs Leliana was officially heterosexual - my world, my rules.

[herkles]

That said, why do you think it is important to have NPCs explicitly identify themselves as demisexual? I personally don't think a label is necessary, because you can roleplay however you like in your world. In my Origins playthroughs Leliana was officially heterosexual - my world, my rules.

 

so she never fell in love with Marjorlane? She is bisexual, just because she falls in love with a male warden doesn't mean she isn't bisexual. 

[In Exile]

That said, why do you think it is important to have NPCs explicitly identify themselves as demisexual? I personally don't think a label is necessary, because you can roleplay however you like in your world. In my Origins playthroughs Leliana was officially heterosexual - my world, my rules.

 

In your origins playthrough, Leliana was a bisexual who had been madly in love with another woman who betrayed her. You don't get a say in that. 

[dlux]

Leliana only mentioned that she loved Marjolaine. You can love somebody without wanting to get in their pants. But maybe I missed some details, so you can correct me if I'm wrong.

 

Anyway, I had no idea that she was a bisexual character until I read about it. So she is still heterosexual in my world, because that is how I roleplayed her.

[Hanako Ikezawa]

That said, why do you think it is important to have NPCs explicitly identify themselves as demisexual? I personally don't think a label is necessary, because you can roleplay however you like in your world. In my Origins playthroughs Leliana was officially heterosexual - my world, my rules.

Again, the character never has to explicitly identify themselves as such. We know The Iron Bull won't identify himself as pansexual for example because those terms don't exist in Thedas. The writer of the character explicitly identifying the character as such would be enough, like how Patrick Weekes did for The Iron Bull. 

 

As for headcanoning sexualities on characters, that will only lead to problems. We just have to look at Dragon Age 2 to see that. 

[old_dawn]

Leliana only mentioned that she loved Marjolaine. You can love somebody without wanting to get in their pants. But maybe I missed some details, so you can correct me if I'm wrong.

 

Anyway, I had no idea that she was a bisexual character until I read about it. So she is still heterosexual in my world, because that is how I roleplayed her.

Well the option of inviting her into a threesome (or foursome) with Isabella is always there regardless if you don't choose that dialogue option or don't even meet Isabella. So that must mean Leliana is bisexual.

[In Exile]

Leliana only mentioned that she loved Marjolaine. You can love somebody without wanting to get in their pants. But maybe I missed some details, so you can correct me if I'm wrong.

 

Anyway, I had no idea that she was a bisexual character until I read about it. So she is still heterosexual in my world, because that is how I roleplayed her.

 

You can't roleplay characters who aren't your own. That's why you don't get to chose her dialogue. 

 

Leliana is very explicit and obvious about the fact that she's in love with Majorlaine, not that she cares about her a lot as a friend. Someone doesn't have to lift up a placard that says "Having sex with [Insert Name]" to get across that the person is having sex with [Insert Name]. 

[dlux]

Well the option of inviting her into a threesome (or foursome) with Isabella is always there regardless if you don't choose that dialogue option or don't even meet Isabella. So that must mean Leliana is bisexual.

They all took turns with my Warden.
 

You can't roleplay characters who aren't your own. That's why you don't get to chose her dialogue.

Uh, yes I can. -> playersexual companions.

Leliana is very explicit and obvious about the fact that she's in love with Majorlaine, not that she cares about her a lot as a friend. Someone doesn't have to lift up a placard that says "Having sex with [Insert Name]" to get across that the person is having sex with [Insert Name].

I don't think so. I just had the feeling that she really cared for her.

Like I said, I had no idea that Leliana was bisexual (or playersexual) until I read about it. In my world Leliana is heterosexual until she says that she is bisexual and has sex with women.

[Hanako Ikezawa]

Uh, yes I can. -> playersexual companions.

Bioware confirmed that Anders, Fenris, Isabela, and Merrill are all bisexual. The player does not change their sexuality.