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Message: <blockquote data-quote="mhacdebhandia" data-source="post: 1721481" data-attributes="member: 18832">The character in question doesn't act like real women I know. *shrug* That's all I can say.I haven't read the novels, but the available evidence does not indicate to me that Jordan's cultures are tremendously different from the standard pseudo-historical European model of fantasy, in which men and women are much like their modern counterparts save for existing in an unenlightened society where it takes something like near-exclusive access to magical power to establish women as powerful individuals in their own right. Therefore, I would not readily believe that the player in question is perfectly reproducing the women of the novels, especially in light of the many discussions about how the female protagonists and supporting cast all share very strange traits which both real-life women and the PC in question lack - like the whole cross-your-arms-underneath-your-bust-and-sniff response of disapproval.But that's an aside. Out of all the many women I know - and my social circle is about evenly gender-balanced, unusual for a social group based around a gaming society - the PC in question resembles none of them. I cannot put a name to the traits I see that are lacking, but let me assure you that I'm not fool enough to think that, for example, women are more emotional and men more logical, or women more caring and men more defensive, or whatever.Rather, I am convinced that the only reason the PC in question is female is because the player wanted to play a spellcaster without having to deal with the opprobrium faced by male spellcasters in the setting, and that either he is incapable of expressing a feminine personality (which is frankly most likely, since he's kind of a strange and unempathetic person anyway) or, to give him the benefit of the doubt, he's consciously or unconsciously restraining the impulse to have his character behave like any of the many real women he knows for fear of being thought a caricature.As I say, the character doesn't act like a man, either. It's not as simple as the PC's being either a man in a funny suit or a one-dimensional sex-driven cartoon like some other people I know (and refuse to play with) often portray.While I agree that 90% of any given character's personality will be independent of their gender, there is definitely a gender-based (culturally-driven or no) component of personality in real life, and it's something that I think careful observation of real men or women and imaginative extrapolation can help any roleplayer express.</blockquote>

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