Jeremy Ackerman-Yost
Explorer
Well, I guess I'm a bit of a latecomer, but...
Which is not to say I have a problem with people playing against gender (clarification: I have a problem wiht certain people playing across gender). But I understand why it can be unsettling to many.
Of course, I suspect that's the point.
And just to extend to full-fledged hijackitude...
Really? Every woman I know who read those books *hates* his portrayal of women with a passion. Only 1 of 5 has kept reading past book 4, and that only because she's as obsessive about stories as I am. If you start, you MUST see it through to the end. Unfortunately, since I was the one who (inadvertantly) turned her on to the books, she takes her irritation with the author out on me. I thought I was going to be beaten to death with a hardcover book when she got to the part where ...
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Actually, the notion that Jordan is in any way correct about the way the female psyche works is giving me the heebie-jeebies.
But that's not an excuse for all but perhaps 2 of the women to have intensely combative relationships with all men, and one of the non-combative ones (Min) is one of the more striking examples of unrealistic behavior in the book. Though on that point I guess YMMV and all that.
Absolutely. However, we have fewer (and certainly less ingrained) notions of how Dwarves, Elves, and Gnomes are *supposed* to act. Our gender roles have been dictated to us since birth. Tweaking them is somewhat more jarring than a deviation from "elfishness."jmucchiello said:What is the difference in difficulty between playing against gender compared to playing against race? IOW, why do you feel a male cannot portray a "realistic" female character but you probably have no problem with 21st century humans portraying pseudo-mideval 1,000 year living elves who are considered whelps in their 100th year of existence, just now striving out on their own? Shouldn't you run into just as many instances of "that's not how a real elf/dwarf/gnome would act?"
Which is not to say I have a problem with people playing against gender (clarification: I have a problem wiht certain people playing across gender). But I understand why it can be unsettling to many.
That might be part of the reason, but I tend to suspect that it's part of our culture's homophobia and inherent gender bias. I'm a pretty comfortably hetero male (despite theSpark's 8% certainty that I'm female ), but much of the population is not, and they tend to react badly to any stereotypically feminine behavior out of a man. Plus, the entire culture has a subtext of "It's better to be a man." A male roleplaying a female is implicitly taking on a social role that is weaker than his native one. This seems less palatable to people than girls who want to be boys. After all, our entire culture tells us it's better to be a boy. When a little girl plays basketball or plays with trucks, she's considered a tomboy, which is often "cute." Especially nowadays. Keira Knightley is building a nice career for herself out of exploiting this. Implication: it's OK for a girl to act like a boy. Heck, it's even "sexy" (and think about the implications of that for a moment). On the other hand, if a little boy plays with dolls or make-up, well, if dad doesn't step in quick, he probably has an uncle, grandfather, or family friend who will "correct" the situation quickly. Implication: it's not OK for a boy to act like a girl. This, of course, is changing (slowly) among the younger and more urban segments of the population, but the bias is still there.Wombat said:But here is an interesting observation -- through many gaming groups, I have seen that women playing male characters are rarely noted, yet men playing women are often looked at askance. Now this may be due to players having seen too many men playing horrible female characters, or merely hearing about such playing in other people's games.
That depends entirely on how many people have taken the test, of course. But I tend to agree that it's hard to say anything definitive with numbers like that, though. Even if individual questions acheive significance through sheer overwhelming numbers, taken as a collection, the whole thing is pretty iffy.vulcan_idic said:The one statistic they quoted me was something like 48% to 52% or something in that vicinity, which I'm fairly certain isn't a statistically significant margin of difference between the two...
Of course, I suspect that's the point.
And just to extend to full-fledged hijackitude...
Queen_Dopplepopolis said:However, if you are going to do it, pick up some books with strong female characters. I really enjoy some of the female insight in the Wheel of Time books...
Really? Every woman I know who read those books *hates* his portrayal of women with a passion. Only 1 of 5 has kept reading past book 4, and that only because she's as obsessive about stories as I am. If you start, you MUST see it through to the end. Unfortunately, since I was the one who (inadvertantly) turned her on to the books, she takes her irritation with the author out on me. I thought I was going to be beaten to death with a hardcover book when she got to the part where ...
all Rand's "loves" decide they can comfortably share him
Actually, the notion that Jordan is in any way correct about the way the female psyche works is giving me the heebie-jeebies.
Actually, I'd say he's trying fairly effectively to beat you over the head with it in a way as hamhanded as possible.ledded said:I always felt too that he is trying to slowly show how divisiveness between the sexes is at the heart of the problem in fighting the Shadow
But that's not an excuse for all but perhaps 2 of the women to have intensely combative relationships with all men, and one of the non-combative ones (Min) is one of the more striking examples of unrealistic behavior in the book. Though on that point I guess YMMV and all that.