"Misogyny and the Female Body in Dungeons & Dragons"

[Turanil]

[Arrogant and provocative opinion mode]

About denouncing sexism, racism, and other such mis-behaviors in fantasy role-playing-games:

At the core, the authors of such denunciations are gamers with a psychological complex. They are often males without a girlfriend; and their pastime (i.e. rpg) is also generally seen as immature by mainstream society (and of course, women don't like immature men). So their denouncing of sexism, racism, etc., in RPGs (rather than in real life) has a hidden agenda. It's not about promoting some "social justice" for its own sake. In fact, it's secretly about telling the potential female reader, that they are gentle mature men (i.e. who thus deserve their sexual interest).

Hence, the so-called "social justice warriors" in fact seek a (pathetic) way at trying to show how they are morally superiors, interested in mature subjects, caring for others, etc., as they believe that this will overshadow their interest in escapism / infantile pastimes, and thus will make them look much better in the eyes of any girl they might want to lay with.



[/Arrogant and provocative opinion mode]

[Kiero]

Generally it is bad form to quote the first post on the third post.

Bad form to quote it in it's entirety, but not the specific part you're responding to, so everyone is clear what's going on.

[JeremyR]

The other problem is that the author assumes that we read Conan and Fafhrd and the Mouser stories because they are sexist, not that we read them because they are entertaining stories.

I thought about posting this over there but realized that I don't want to get any of that shit on me.

Even if they are, so what? Women have quite a lot of fiction aimed at them. Pretty much the entire fantasy field is now supernatural romance thanks to Twilight and its ilk.

Not to mention you have erotic fan fiction of some of these properties having the names and some other things changed and become major hits and turned into Hollywood movies. Not just 50 Shades of Grey, there was some other thing that started as Harry Potter slash fiction, with incest no less, and that got turned into a movie...

Stuff aimed at women, it's just them exploring their sexuality, blah blah blah

Stuff aimed at men, it's male power fantasy, misogyny, etc.

[yabaziou]

I would like to agree with your premise, Turanil, but 4 of the most annoying SJW that I know are 1/ married, 2/ have offspring (and it is not a rock band this time) and 3/ 2 of them are females. The winners are David A Hill, Topher, Filamena Youg (David's spouse) and Anna Kreider (Wundergeek).

So the "SJW pestilence" has another origin (I have no issue with people who are engaged in the betterment of justice and social equity but please, mere internet activism is not enough).

And I think that this article is off the mark because the misoginy of the two men cited are more a thing of the american culture of this time than a sign of extra bigotery from them and D&D 5 is one of the most woman friendly edition that I see. The women pictured there are both nice to look at and competent : the warrior sports a serious amor, the sorceress wears a standard robe, etc.

I see bigotery and disinformation at work here, not social critic.

[Justin Alexander]

The strip was an example of the American cultural norm that homosexual rape is funny. I'd agree that, being a joke about male slaves homosexually raped by the monsters, it makes no sense as an example of a supposed heterosexual 'rape culture'

More importantly, the entire joke hinges on rape being an immoral and unacceptable thing. "Rape culture" specifically refers to a set of values in which the severity of the crime is laughed off, the victim is blamed ("she was asking for it by wearing that dress"), and/or the the perpetrator is excused ("boys will be boys"). This joke is literally the polar opposite of rape culture. If anything, it is specifically criticizing rape culture.

which culture does not exist in mainstream US society, AFAICT

Great progress has been made since the term "rape culture" was coined in 1975, but there are still rapists successfully presenting "she wore slutty clothing" as a defense (to pick only the easiest example of how rape culture persists).

It's like saying that racism no longer exists in American culture because Jim Crow laws got overturned or because Barack Obama got arrested. At best you look clueless.

[S'mon]

It's like saying that racism no longer exists in American culture because Jim Crow laws got overturned or because Barack Obama got arrested.

Freudian slip there, mate.

[yabaziou]

Freudian slip there, mate.

Indeed ! Obama has his foibles but he is not Franck Underwood (to my knowledge at least).

[Future Villain Band]

[Arrogant and provocative opinion mode]

About denouncing sexism, racism, and other such mis-behaviors in fantasy role-playing-games:

At the core, the authors of such denunciations are gamers with a psychological complex. They are often males without a girlfriend; and their pastime (i.e. rpg) is also generally seen as immature by mainstream society (and of course, women don't like immature men). So their denouncing of sexism, racism, etc., in RPGs (rather than in real life) has a hidden agenda. It's not about promoting some "social justice" for its own sake. In fact, it's secretly about telling the potential female reader, that they are gentle mature men (i.e. who thus deserve their sexual interest).

Hence, the so-called "social justice warriors" in fact seek a (pathetic) way at trying to show how they are morally superiors, interested in mature subjects, caring for others, etc., as they believe that this will overshadow their interest in escapism / infantile pastimes, and thus will make them look much better in the eyes of any girl they might want to lay with.



[/Arrogant and provocative opinion mode]

Or maybe they just hate to see people get bullied and treated shabbily?

I tend to take people at face value.  I don't think so-called around-here SJWs are crypto-pickup artists or trying to ruin gaming or anything like that, I think they just see a problem where you don't, or they prioritize it higher than the problems you see.  Just like, with very few exceptions, I tend to take the complaints around here seriously, except when it's very clear somebody's acting in bad faith.

The Gamergate fiasco is a perfect example of how two groups can hold completely incompatible views as to the basic nature of a disagreement, each side choosing to focus on bad actors on the other side to the exclusion of other people.  The Internet allows for this kind of totally parallel discussion which never meets in an actual confrontation.

[Alzrius]

The influence of media has been thoroughly tested in the world of advertising.

Advertisers frequently manipulate fictional details of their message - like what a spokesperson looks like, lighting, music, etc. - and furthermore do careful studies about how effective these are on the market.  They generally find that both children and adults are influenced by fictional details that have nothing to do with the factual qualities of the product.

It's worth noting that this is different from the premise that fiction (in the context of any form of media) will promote and reinforce values that aren't overtly presented within the context of the narrative.

It's one thing to make sure a spokesperson uses the correct buzzwords when telling you to buy their brand of toothpaste - the premise is being told to you via direct communication; any subtext that's present works because it's reinforcing the super-text. It's quite another thing to look at Joss Whedon's Firefly and say that it propagates rape culture.

It might be nice to live in a world where people are perfectly rational and never influenced by irrational things like the appearance or tone of voice of a spokesperson. However, I am pretty convinced that people are not purely rational, and are influenced by these irrelevant fictional details.

In terms of people making their own decisions, I agree that "rationality" (e.g. logic) is often - if not usually - not part of the equation. But I don't think that that's the underlying issue. The underlying issue is that people aren't helpless before their subconscious urges, and that even if some piece of fiction is subconsciously interpreted as having a particular message regarding values, I believe that one of the defining characteristics of being both mature and mentally competent is that you have the ability to evaluate those messages and discard them or incorporate them into your moral structure as you prefer, rather than automatically accepting any supposed message that you're bombarded with.

It is possible to overstate the influence of these things, but I think the influence exists.

Even if that's so, I don't think that it's very influential, for the above reasons.

[yabaziou]

Or maybe they just hate to see people get bullied and treated shabbily?

Since the Consultagate, I am pretty sure the so-called SJW have nothing to do with justice and are more likely bullies at heart with different cloths on.

And bullying don't seem to bother them when it comes to their "foes" like Desbourough, Zak S. or the Pundit ...

[flyerfan1991]

Even if they are, so what? Women have quite a lot of fiction aimed at them. Pretty much the entire fantasy field is now supernatural romance thanks to Twilight and its ilk.

Just to clarify, the rise of Urban Fantasy predated Twilight, and that a lot of feminists I know hate that series with a passion.  (Thank goodness.)

[AmazingOnionMan]

It's one thing to make sure a spokesperson uses the correct buzzwords when telling you to buy their brand of toothpaste - the premise is being told to you via direct communication; any subtext that's present works because it's reinforcing the super-text. It's quite another thing to look at Joss Whedon's Firefly and say that it propagates rape culture.

And it is quite another thing to bring the ramblings of a clearly demented person into this. Hilarious, in a deeply troubling way, as that link was, this discussion would be much better if we stayed in the center and not in the outer fringes of cuckoo-ville.

[Alzrius]

And it is quite another thing to bring the ramblings of a clearly demented person into this. Hilarious, in a deeply troubling way, as that link was, this discussion would be much better if we stayed in the center and not in the outer fringes of cuckoo-ville.

That's a fair point. I was originally going to say "It's quite another thing to look at American Gothic and conclude that it's promoting racism because of its lack of ethnic diversity," but I couldn't resist the temptation to go for a more extreme example. Mea culpa there.

[dragoner]

Bad form to quote it in it's entirety, but not the specific part you're responding to, so everyone is clear what's going on.

Because clearly that wasn't sarcasm, clearly. Even if there is a grain of truth to it, overall.

[Daztur]

The main problem with all of this is how many steps it takes from "this is sexist!" to actually making anyone's lives better. Basically:

1. Is this author sexist (or racist or homophobic or transphobic or what have you)?
2. If I do stuff that makes life more difficult for this author will it decrease his/her ability to propagate sexism?
3. Is the sexism that I'm preventing this author from propagating virulent enough to influence its readers?
4. If the sexism is virulent enough to influence its readers, will it cause them to act on that sexism?
5. Will these acts of sexism make other people's lives worth?

Basically unless you can answer "yes" all down the line then you're making the author's life worse without making anyone's life better so you're making the world just a little bit worse. Making the world worse is bad and you shouldn't do it.

I think it's a lot like how a lot of people say "game publishers should do X because it would make the game more appealing to new players" when what they really mean is "I really like X" but feel a bit silly saying "game designers should do X because that's what I want and they should like to what I say!" It's totally fine to love X but casting it as a campaign to bring in new players is just disingenuous.

The same thing goes with the Drama Club stuff, people feel a bit silly saying "you shouldn't include chain mail bikinis because I don't like them and you should listen to what I say!" so they dress it up as social issue, as if a bit of cheesecake is going to make the world a worse place.

Now there's nothing wrong with not liking chainmail bikinis, or not buying stuff that has them because you don't want them in your RPG books, I think they're pretty silly myself but people taking the leap from that to that they're making the world a worse place requires some pretty massive leaps of logic and almost always get glossed over.