Player and Character Gender Sterotypes

[Starfox]

The Gaming through denial thread reminded me of an observation about player vs. character gender that I thought might be worth discussing.

My experience is that male players playing female characters generally want the gender of the character to matter, while female players playing female character's don't want any emphasis on gender.

I used to find this odd, but thinking about it, this is actually very natural.

For a male player to take a female role is making a choice to step out and explore something different. And for this choice to matter, the gender of the character has to actually affect play is some way. It doesn't matter so much whether the character's gender experience is positive or negative, as long as it is different. Sure, there are male players who write "female" for gender (or even roll for gender) and then play the character as genderless, but this is not the norm.

Women players are not going out on a limb when playing female characters. They encounter female-specific situations every day in real life, and for them this is not escapism. In a fantasy game, playing a woman character is the neutral choice and they want to explore the standard fantasy tropes from such a role, same as a male player playing a male character. Such characters might seem genderless in the game, because the player isn't interested in exploring gender issues.

I've not played with a lot of women players who played male characters, so I can't speak of what that's like, but I suppose gender exploration could be on the agenda here, same as it often is for male players playing female characters.

Race selection is somewhat similar in my gaming group. Around here, few players select elf just for the dexterity and low-light vision or halfling for the stealth bonus, we actually want to play the race because it is different and nonhuman. Human is the default race in almost every campaign, by player choice. A player who chooses to play nonhuman does so for a reason, and generally wants to explore that race's uniqueness in some way - either it's physiology, psychology, or social role. Since I've never played with a nonhuman player, that question doesn't come up, but I guess the default race choice for an elven player would be elf.

It took me some time to come to this realization, and I'm interested in others' views and opinions. I admit I've gamed mostly as a man among male players. I used to think women players wanted their female characters noticed for their gender, much like female characters played by males do, but got burnt a bit when this was not the case. This is my ruminations on why. But I've not discussed this before, and am not sure if I'm right. Am I seeing this too much from a male perspective?

 

[Sunseeker]

When running a game, I sometimes set up sexist or racist/speciest societies. They're a natural feature of a pseudo-medieval fantasy setting, especially when it's written into the lore that certain species are explicitly xenophobic. When I do set up these systems, your character WILL get noticed on any characteristic that is relevant to the society. So if you're in Machoville where women are second class, if you're female expect to be treated like you're second class. If you're in Humanland then expect non-humans to get treated poorly. Having perfectly egalitarian fantasy worlds that are not particularly culturally, socially or technologically advanced always strikes me as a bit too much for my disbelief.

When I play characters, I play someone else. Role-play is not an excuse for me to insert a fantasy-ized version of myself into the world, it's an attempt for me to be creative. There's not much creative about playing myself in a fantasy world. That said these characters aren't horrid deviations from who I am, as everyone puts a little of themselves into their characters. And as above, I expect my characters to get noticed when it is relevant to the game. I don't want people pointing out that I'm a chick just to make it clear that I'm a chick. I'm well aware that I am playing a woman.

However, when I play different sexes, except for when I'm playing a character whose gender plays a particularly important role in who they are, I treat all my characters like "people". (cue Spock "I find that comment, insulting.") That is I don't make an issue about them being female or treat them differently because they're an elf. Each character is their own character but unless there's a particular reason for it, their sex plays only a minor role in who they are.

I don't think how "female" one gets treated should be based on the needs of the gameworld and the desires of the player. If you're in a highly sexually-divided society, that obviously brings it up more. If your character is particularly feminine, then that brings it up more too. But outside of that I think people should be regarded in a generally neutral manner.