I can't believe I'm saying this, but I feel like I must write an essay on this. I'm cross-posting this from elsewhere, and I want to cast a wide net of responses and tips. Please evaluate it and tell me where I can improve.
Actually, it's less of an essay and more of a post I'm planning to put on the forum.
Basically, giantitp forums are a haven for tabletop gamers, especially D&D players. Every so often someone makes a thread about female characters in D&D. Time and time again, we get the same old song: someone says something sexist in a wrongheaded way or expresses disbelief in women warriors, people react, people defend said sexism, conversation goes from gender portrayals in tabletop games to off-topic dicussion sexism in real-world modern day society (which does not tie back into the topic at hand). Troll posters jump in to say that feminists are all meanies, mod locks the thread.
Link 1. This thread is a very good example of the phenomena. OP asks about a hypothetical of a DM limiting Strength caps for female PCs because "realism," and surprisingly there were defendants of this make-believe DM. Some of the most egregious posts include the familiar "Political Correctness gone mad!" and "Women players shouldn't be offended because the PC is make-believe, like dragons or orcs!"
Link 2. On a similar thread, of an OP who has trouble imagining women taking up arms for a living.
I have no problem discussing gender portrayals in games, and there can be a lot of good to gain from this.
But discussion about this issue is difficult because:
1. Political discussion is not allowed on giantip, so using real-world examples of how sexism in games is problematic must be restricted so.
2. One or two of the feminist posters can be jerks at times, unfortunately, even if they're right about a lot of things. One got mad at me in a thread when I encouraged people to start reporting off-topic posts (thread was originally discussing drow matriarchy, but devolved into conversation about women in the Middle East or something I can't remember), and argued that she should be allowed to be off-topic when talking about sexism. Jerk posters come in to insult her as a hyper-feminist, even though her feminist opinions are pretty moderate and mainstream. I reported those posts as well.
3. Whenever this comes up, whether it's people criticizing sexism or denying it, I notice the same usernames popping up again and again. It's the same people arguing most of the time.
But this issue is going to keep happening again and again, and simply not talking about it isn't going to lead to progress. However, I was planning on making a post in "Board/Site Issues" about this, and wanted you folks to look over it. Below is what the post will look like:
The Essay
I've been thinking about this a lot, and not just because I posted. Although not quite common, a similar trend emerges on this board, where a poster starts up a thread about women/gender issues in RPGs. The most recent example is Agrippa's
"Would you tolerate a DM..."thread. Several months ago there was one entitled
"Female warriors and physical aggression."Both cases bear striking similarity; an uncomfortable attitude towards the existence of strong, martial women in a tabletop game.
Discouragingly, both threads ended up locked, the former in the case of the conversation being derailed from sexist DMs and house rules towards real-world racial issues. I believe that discussion of gender issues in RPGs is important, not only because acknowledgement of trends and portrayals in fiction are a valid form of critique, but because in recent years there is an elephant in the room: portrayal of women and incidents of sexism within the tabletop fandom. And while many gamers are decent people, there is a not-so-insignificent segment among the tabletop community which propagates an atmosphere unwelcoming to women. And is being discussed in many areas, both among fans and game designers.
Now, I don't believe that I can cover the whole issue with but a single post, but I will go over the major things:
Particularly in regards to "realism." It's almost never about realism. An 18 in any ability score represents an individual who is highly gifted, the cream of the crop. Quoting Awaken_DM Golem on another board:
1E used a nearly linear STR scale of 10*# = weight you can lift over your head.
So an 18 STR can lift 180 pounds over his(her!) head.
And who did the ancient Greeks call Amazons anyway.
I go google just a little.
2013 Junior Pan Am (hey tough guy it's "Juniors")
Ellen Kercher put 68kg on the more difficult lift, and 81kg on the 2 step move.
81kg * 2.2convert = 178.2 pounds
Now her performing class weight is available to google too, but hey look at her
... she's tiny, like smaller than that tough guy DM.
And who said that 18 Str women are unrealistic?
I'll say it again, because it bears repeating: DMs who create this rule usually stop there. It requires little effort to make a blanket statement about "all women in my game are..." but it takes a lot of effort to make a plausible economic system or a health/damage track just like real-world wounds. It takes commonly-held assumptions about women and enshrines it in unbendable game stats. It never takes in the other side of the equation, like giving a Constitution cap for men for stereotypes of lower pain thresholds ("you'd never be able to handle childbirth!") and shorter life spans. This is due to the perception of male as the norm, which extends beyond games and into our culture: women characters in the media comprise around 5-20% of show casts, but are 50% of the world's population.
"It's just a game! How's it different than game mechanics for different fantasy races?"It's different in the sense that elves, orcs, and dragons do not exist. Women exist, and comprise a significant portion of our population. We can afford some liberties with fantasy creatures because they're wholly fictional: if dwarves are strong due to divine blessings of Moradin, we can accept that as part of the setting.
When one crosses into reality is when things get problematic. When you deal with real people, inaccuracies are less tolerable. Particularly when we reinforce stereotypes.
It's not escapism when a women who, after dealing with some sexist customers at her retail job, visits the FLGS at game night and is blatantly told by the DM that her Lady in Shining Armor character concept is invalid. Particularly after rolling that 18, a 9.34% chance with a 4d6 drop the lowest roll six times! You'd feel cheated, too, if the DM discarded your amazing success!
We also play games to escape from the real world, where we can bust in the face of the evil lich with a spiked gauntlet as the conclusion to a satisfying adventure, where we can be real Heroes capable of feats impossible in our world. Wizards traveling the planes for hidden knowledge, Dragonriders leaping off their mount to soar through the air onto an enemy wyrm, and monks who can dance on the head of a needle are but a few things not only possible in D&D, but encouraged.
A women clad in full plate, pulling a dragon by the tail for a closer kill, or absorbing the blow of an ogre with her mighty shield might sound implausible to many, but it sure is cool and empowering, the kind of things PCs should be able to do.
Oftentimes, especially in regards to historical RPGs, I've often heard the "women can't be fighters" said over and over. The reality is that women in many historical instances contributed to society beyond being baby-making machines. They were queens, business owners, scientists, philosophers, and even warriors. And not just the Joans of Arc and Annie Oaklies of the world. You know the mythical Amazons? The stories had more than a hint of truth: in ancient times the Scythians, mounted warriors, had about 20% of their military groups comprised of women.
This has been observed through examination of over 40 burial mounds by archeologists.Among the Vikings, it was legal for women to avenge the death of family members as part of a blood feud.The Colosseum of ancient Rome had some skilled female gladiators, and Roman soldiers writing of their experiences in the war with Gaul told of women who fought just as eagerly as the men.During the Mexican Revolution, women were a significant contribution to Emiliano Zapata's army, as writers, politicians, and soldiers and officers.This is historical accuracy. This is realism.Make no mistake, tabletop gaming is primarily a male-dominated hobby. But there are many women gamers out there, from Vampire to Shadowrun. Most gamers are nice, decent people, but you know what they say about the squeakiest wheel getting the grease.
Examples of problematic behavior:[1]CthulhuTech had not one, but 3 adventures dealing with graphic, onscreen rape, which the PCs cannot avert.
[2]Exalted 2nd Edition, Vampire the Masquerade, and even Call of Cthulhu included rape scenes (and even an illustrated picture!) in fiction or setting detail.
[3]James Desborough published several blatantly sexist RPG books laughing at women instead of with them. He excessively talked about rape, both as jokes and its inclusion in games. He even went so far as to write an essay entitled "In Defense of Rape" to attract controversy by making his point in the worst way possible.
[4]There is a higher-than-average amount of transgender gamers in the tabletop fandom, from players to game designers. The RPG Site is a significant website among the Old School D&D community, more than a few comprised of people banned from rpg.net. Due to rpg.net being transgender-friendly and banning sexist comments, the RPG Site views the hobby itself as under attack by ultra-liberals. This leads to common comments of viewing criticism of problematic content and misogyny/transphobia as "political correctness gone mad," and even siding with some very shifty folks in their vendetta against the website. Various publishers advertise on their site, so it's not "fringe," particularly if you consume old-school retroclones.
[5]Maid the RPG's earlier printings did not omit incidents of pedophilia played for laughs as the result of poor editing.
Rape is a minefield in the realm of fiction. The problem is not the inclusion of rape itself so much as how it's handled. Tabletop gaming sessions are very risky, as a lot of people connect with their created characters, and the environment can get personal ("you attack the orc," "you find a hidden gem," you, you, you).
Rape is a common threat for many girls and women, in some areas as many as 1 in 4 women will suffer a sexual assault in their lifetime. Even worse, many societies worldwide (including the Western world) do not treat it with the severity it deserves, blaming women for their style of dress, asking why she didn't fight back harder, or even covering it up in the case of religious orders! And men have it bad, too: female teachers who rape male students are viewed as sex symbols and the boys as "lucky," while male prisoners who get raped are laughed about or said to "deserve it for being a criminal."
Rape is a major issue that our culture has not come around to fully recognizing as a horrible act (only if its a violent, stranger rape), and many people can suffer post-traumatic flashbacks when it's handled poorly in media, and feel isolated if they see people treat its portrayal as no different than any other sex act.
Which brings me to a common fallacy I hear, notably from the CthulhuTech developers: "Why do we treat sex even worse than violence? Such a repressed culture!" Well no, rape
is violence. It's something which cannot be brushed off so easily as something like killing a bandit in self-defense, or as justifiable as other forms of murder. Dismissing the feelings of those who get upset about it as "being unable to handle mature games," "repressed prudes," et cetera, sends a message (even unintentionally) that women gamers should stop complaining about a very common and very personal fear.
Jim Sterling, a video game critic, discusses the issue far better than I ever can.Just because someone says that a game element is sexist, insensitive, ethnically problematic, et cetera does not automatically mean that you as a fan condone it. The thing about tabletop RPGs is that there are many games and many books written by different authors. And its decades-long history has progressed along with society. When Gygax and friends started playing the first D&D sessions, 2nd wave feminism was still progressing. In the 90s White Wolf was doing its best to be inclusive of all races and cultures in their games, but lack of research and exposure to said cultures resulted in flat stereotypes.
I love Dungeons & Dragons. I love Vampire. I love Shadowrun, Deadlands, and even Call of Cthulhu. But they all have content which if examined closely, is very troubling. Magical Native Americans in Werewolf, Neo-Confederate apologia in Deadlands, and even a creation myth for the Drow in Complete Book of Elves which is no different than the real-world Curse of Ham (evil people are marked by their dark skin).
These examples are problematic, but in many cases they might not be dominant in the campaign and can be ignored. Or changed and altered with little consequence. If I ever ran a 1st Edition AD&D game, I'd remove the Strength cap limit for women. Unless the RPG is saturated with problematic content (FATAL), it can be saved.
On a related note, quite a few of these things are buried deep in setting lore, not always caught upon on casual reading. Players of D&D were attracted by a world of fantasy and magic; I got into Deadlands because the idea of playing monster hunters and mad scientists in the Wild West sounded awesome. The other stuff was found later.
An important thing to keep in mind is that writers make mistakes. White Wolf screwed up with World of Darkness: Gypsies, but they since apologized and the original writers don't work anymore. I have no problem continuing buying from them. Gary Gygax later on said that the female strength cap was a mistake to include. Ewen Cluney forgot to excise problematic content from Maid RPG, but when it was brought to his attention he listened to the critics and removed it. Since then I haven't noticed any creepy sex stuff in his works. And I'm sure that in my years of writing stuff and homebrew, I probably erred somewhere.
Barring the irredeemable (FATAL), game designers who make mistakes aren't going to be forced out of the industry or lose their buyers if they make some honest mistakes. What's more important is how they react to criticism. A writer who doubles down on his stereotypical "noble savage" African nation while ranting about the PC Police is digging himself into a deeper hole.
Is World of Darkness: Gypsies racist? Yes. Is it sexist to impose an artificial limitation on female PCs in D&D? Yes.
But that doesn't make all WoD and D&D players racist and sexist. We can acknowledge problematic content, change it and discard it, when it impacts other peoples' enjoyment by reinforcing systemic stereotypes and imposes arbitrary limits on common fantasy archetypes. Xena, Warrior Princess, should totally be a valid D&D archetype, and women and members of real-world ethnic groups do not need to be reminded in their gaming sessions of what bigots think about them if it makes them uncomfortable.
"You hyper-feminists ruined the thread!" "You're way too militant!" And "I don't mind feminists, it's the radical feminists I can't stand." When radical is not used in the proper terminology.
It's a common thing I see on the Internet, a regrettable one at that. There are feminists out there who are very rude and lack tact, but that doesn't make their ideological viewpoints extreme. The feminists I've read in the threads here actually have viewpoints in line with mainstream 3rd Wave Feminism, barring one poster's ignorant statement about hate crimes against white people.
Implying that hostility from feminists is "radical or hyper" implies that this is feminism's logical conclusion, that the jerks are the "most feminist" and that to be polite is to be politically moderate.
Going to radical feminism, its terminology is contradictory. Among feminists themselves, it used to mean feminist with anti-capitalist leanings, or feminists who focus on the hypothesis of patriarchy as a system of power that organizes society into a complex of relationships based on the assertion that male supremacy[1] oppresses women. Nowadays, the term is mostly adopted by anti-transgender hate groups, much to the chagrin of what few pro-transgender radical feminists still remain.
Outside feminism, it's most often used as an insult to refer to feminists who get worked up and angry about gender issues, regardless of their actual viewpoints. Also as a snarl word to imply that most feminists hate men.
Feminist groups overall do a lot of good work. They support battered women's shelters, rape crisis centers, LGBT rights, access to birth control and abortion for women and girls, among many other things. The portrayal of them all as man-haters, and who shame fellow women for wearing make-up and dresses is inaccurate and harmful. While such types do exist, it really depends on what part of the Internet you hang out on. There are feminists who don't want the help of men, but there are many more who are all too happy to let male allies join their cause (including bell hooks, radical feminist in the anti-capitalist sense). There are feminists who put on make-up and dresses, such as Wendy Davis. When feminists criticize and challenge traditional and conventional gender norms, they mostly do it in the sense of systems which coerce and shame women into adopting restrictive roles.
