D&D 5E The Misrepresentation of Charisma

[FormerlyHemlock]

Grab a magazine - any magazine - and look at all the unhealthily underweight models.

It it seems odd that somebody could be part of modern society and be blissfully unaware of this.

I'll have to take your word for it. The kinds of magazines you're talking about sound like the magazines I avoid. (And aren't they all airbrushed and photoshopped anyway?) I'm talking about people that I know in real life.

 

[Morrus]

I'll have to take your word for it. The kinds of magazines you're talking about sound like the magazines I avoid. (And aren't they all airbrushed and photoshopped anyway?) I'm talking about people that I know in real life.

It's all magazines.

 

[Yunru]

It's all magazines.

New Scientist? Umm... Playboy? Huh, I don't really read a lot of magazines.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

It's all magazines.

I assure you, it is not.

 

[Maxperson]

I assure you, it is not.

Yeah. It's only magazines with models in them, which since they pretty much all have adds, is all of them.

 

[Morrus]

Yeah, it's the ads in them. An entire industry pervaded by this problem where the standard of beauty is unhealthy undernourishment. I heard on the news that some outlets are banning zero-size models now, at last.

 

[GMMichael]

Wait, are we talking about the really really, professionally, good-looking models? They drink orange-mocha-frappuccinos. Not healthy.

For what it's worth, being healthy results in looking better. So does wearing makeup and being airbrushed. If you really want your Charisma score to reflect your looks, I suppose you could choose either route to looking better. Unless you have one of those DMs who wants to play your character for you...

#NotWotCStaff

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[Morrus]

Well, getting beyond the whole magazine issue (which is a serious one), the underlying issue is the extent to which you believe that "beauty" (comeliness, attractiveness) is something that is completely independent of social norms, or not.

@Hemlock has hypothesized that it is inherently a function of health. In effect, this is the genetic hypothesis. One's beauty is determined by one's health - how fit one is to breed. You are attractive because you are healthy, and able to carry on the genes. Now, I personally believe that this is a component, but it is not (by far) the most important component of beauty.

It is not hard to find example of how social norms make the mark of what is, and isn't, beauty. Heck, you can see this explored in the classic TV show "The Twilight Zone," (The Eye of the Beholder). There has been a trend from the 1970s (drugs!) to recently regarding certain weights for women on the low and unhealthy side that has not always been followed; look, for example, to the very word "Rubenesque" for a counterexample (it used to be that being slightly overweight, in a time of scarcity, was a symbol of wealth, success, and beauty). Cultural norms of beauty can have "unhealthy" outcomes- whether it is footbinding, neck elongation, or other rituals. There was a romatnicization, in some parts, of the waifish aspects of the tuberculosis patient. And so on.

In addition, one can look at our often misapplied standard with regards to being fit in regards to women. Being athletic can be attractive; being too muscular can be seen as unattractive, or too "trained" (the rail-thin, no-fat approach of some women runners). But some do appreciate that. One can look at the popular discourse over the Williams sisters in tennis.

In short, attractiveness has components that do have elements of health, social elements, and also certain other features. I have known very healthy (never gotten sick a day in their life) people who aren't BEAUTIFUL/HANDSOME, and others that regularly have been sick or sickly that do get sick. I believe that there is a correlation between health and beauty- just as there is a correlation between strength and health, and intelligence and wisdom, but that they are also independent of each other.

In the end, as I wrote before, I just let players describe their characters as they see fit.

Fin.

Historically, beauty and wealth have correlated - there have been times that being overweight was a sign of wealth, and considered attractive. In medieval times, (for white people) being thin and tanned wasa sign you are poor and work in the fields; being fat and pale was a sign you were comfortable and did not do manual labour. Corresponding standards of beauty tracked with that.

These days, the reverse seems to be true. Millionaire movie stars are often thin and fit. It's a sign of wealth and success.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Well, getting beyond the whole magazine issue (which is a serious one), the underlying issue is the extent to which you believe that "beauty" (comeliness, attractiveness) is something that is completely independent of social norms, or not.

@Hemlock has hypothesized that it is inherently a function of health. In effect, this is the genetic hypothesis. One's beauty is determined by one's health - how fit one is to breed. You are attractive because you are healthy, and able to carry on the genes. Now, I personally believe that this is a component, but it is not (by far) the most important component of beauty.

Sort of, but not exactly. I'm hypothesizing that "beauty", from an evolutionary standpoint, is a signal for health*. Like all signals, it can be forged (that's what makeup, airbrushing, etc. are), and evolution isn't perfect so you can wind up with a signal that doesn't correlate perfectly with the underlying trait. But overall yes, I'm arguing that using Constitution as a proxy for purely physical attractiveness is as reasonable as anything else we do in D&D, e.g. treating cardiovascular health and immunological health as perfect correlates both represented by Constitution.

In short, attractiveness has components that do have elements of health, social elements, and also certain other features. I have known very healthy (never gotten sick a day in their life) people who aren't BEAUTIFUL/HANDSOME, and others that regularly have been sick or sickly that do get sick. I believe that there is a correlation between health and beauty- just as there is a correlation between strength and health, and intelligence and wisdom, but that they are also independent of each other.

In the end, as I wrote before, I just let players describe their characters as they see fit.

I acknowledge such nuances without feeling the need to represent them in the game. If you want to say your Con 6 PC is waifishly beautiful anyway, fine; but by default, I'm going to perceive a Con 16 Cha 7 PC as a big dumb hunk of movie-star-gorgeous foot-in-mouth eye-candy (like Kevin the secretary from 2016's Ghostbusters), but a Con 7 Cha 16 PC as strangely compelling despite his physical flaws (like Rasputin).

*ObVolo's: hags perceive lank hair, warts and bruises as beautiful, and smooth skin and healthy hair as repulsive. Only the youngest and humblest of hags can stand to fake conventional beauty using illusions in order to fit in with the fey courts. I wonder what quality it is that hags' sense of beauty is keyed into. Magical power maybe? If aunties and grandmothers naturally get more wrinkled and wartier over time, as most people in fact do, and if exposure to the dark arts and weird magic of hags tends to cause additional physical deformities over time, then forging wrinkles/warts/etc. might be a sign of power, which is attractive to hags, whereas smooth skin might be a sign of impotence, which is not.