LGBTQ and Feminism Issues

General
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I tried to do a portrayal I asked help and I received is veiled threats and say Who are you doing talking about this being cis It is true that i also received lots of good feedback. . I did read books I asked several trans people and see several Lgbtq docs and info.

But that reaction without even read my content. Make me be convinced that If you aren’t lgbtq you can’t write about a struggle or anything no matter how investigation you do. You will fail, and do more harm than good.

So i totally change my content, because i want to help community, and sometimes that means don’t do certain stuff

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The thing about games/fiction/movies that tackle the struggles of being queer/changing society to make that more accepted as a central part of the story is that I don’t want to read/play them. Discrimination against queer people is something I deal with in my actual life. Trying to make society be less terrible to queer people is something I do in my actual life. I don’t want to deal with that in my free time, with things I do for entertainment.

There is a place for stories about queer struggles, and media about that should be written, but that doesn’t mean works where queer people are happy aren’t just as important.

Tl;dr, I am very, very tired of authors putting discrimination about gender and sexuality in games for the sake of “realism”

…is this about your game with the third-gender (morphos) people?

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146

I’m sorry to hear that. Sure, don’t write about something if you feel that you are doing more harm than good, but by the way you’re describing I think that you had an honest intention of doing it well, and that something some people don’t even care about.

I still think it desn’t have to be always the case.

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147

Yeah, That game I erased half part of my lore and now I think is perfectly acceptable . Morpho is a totally fictional gender , similar to zenith in Heroes rise. There also a nb umbrella and select your pronouns clothing and all that. And absolutely no struggle or anything like that.

Edit I think It was better that way , I mean If you won’t be able to help you should change it. I don’t want end like Bioware lol. With Haley

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148

Mara, I think you’re misrepresenting the discussion we (the trans thread) had about your game. Yes, the description of the game you have now is good, but the people in that thread were trying to explain why the idea of a single nonbinary gender with no option for genders outside those three (where nontrinary genders didn’t exist), was harmful to the trans community (as morphos was originally written), and why starting the game as a cis indivudual with body/gender shifting at puberty both did that and stepped on huge dysphoria buttons for many members in the thread.

I don’t recall there being any threats made, and I thought you’d understood our point by the end of the discussion, based on the changes you’d made.

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149

The issue wasn’t that you were cis, the issue was that you were ignoring what people were saying or doing a poor summary of your content. You asked about nb issues and then argued with the feedback you got–which isn’t always an issue, but it was when the feedback was “this is offensive”. The story has a good ending because you did listen and from what I’ve heard I like the changes you made, but when you describe the events like that it paints a very different picture than what actually happened.

Good intentions are really important, but when writing a marginalized identity it’s way, way more important to be able to take the criticism and make the necessary changes. Showing it to sensitivity readers only does as much good as the creator will allow the sensitivity readers to do.

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150

You didn’t read several mails I get lol but that has happen. And I am happy with the result, also I learned a lot of interesting stuff as the two spirit people and the indian community. And several iron age tribes.

Edit That’s the important part learn from one mistakes.

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151

Also (kind of unrelated with the discussion you are having at this moment) I think it’s important to make a distinction between a game that deals with discrimination specifically and one that might feature bigoted characters or just mention that discrimination exist in the world of the narrative.

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152

I’m sorry to hear that, but you still shouldn’t say that “all you received” were threats when a lot of nb people on this forum spent a pretty long time patiently explaining their issues. It’s important to learn from your mistakes and I’m glad you are, and like I said it sounds like you made real improvements, but you still shouldn’t describe the situation as if you didn’t get any useful feedback from the trans community, when you got a lot of it.

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153

That’s generally it though, most people calling for games to “deal with discrimination” generally just mean, “they have characters that are bigots”, and as often as not, have a tacked on “(and those characters aren’t necessarily bad people)”.

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154

So, many times when I see people referring to positively protraying the LGBTQ+ community in mainstream media as a whole (and not taking into account the fluctuations and nuances that pop up within individual games/stories), they usually refer to this:

Treating the character like a normal person. As in: They’re LGBTQ+, yes, but that’s not all they are. Kinda like how @anon86661845 mentioned that the characters will be reduced to one characteristic- this is the opposite. It’s when they have more to the character than just that. They’ve got their struggles, their hopes, their dreams, their skills and the things they aren’t so good at, just like every other character does. While, sure, some of these might be related to the fact that they’re LGBTQ+… not all of them are. The same way that any other character has multiple facets to their personality.

Now, like I said, this is just one definition and it doesn’t apply to everything. Each story has its own nuances and differences that you have to account for and this definition will more or less apply to most of them.

And, speaking from a less general and more personal experience: Heck yeah! I want to see more LGBTQ+ characters! But… y’know, it’s kinda tiring when everybody always states that being LGBTQ+ has to be the main, if not only, thing about that character.

I am ace (or somewhere under there, still trying to wrap my head around where I fall in that umbrella), I am also panromantic. But… I don’t usually come out to people. If it comes up in the conversation (“Who are you interested in?”/“Dating anyone?”/etc.) Yeah, sure, I’ll mention it. But it’s just… not the most important thing to me. It doesn’t make it any less a part of me, it doesn’t mean I’m any less romantically attracted to any/all genders, it doesn’t make it any less important to me. But it also doesn’t mean that’s all I am.

So when you see, time and time again, characters portrayed as LGBTQ+ where their only character trait revolves around that, where their only struggle is about how much discrimination they face… it can start to feel like maybe… maybe I’m not really who I am unless it becomes my dominant trait. That I’m not allowed to be pan unless that is all I am.

My thoughts are getting kinda eclectic- and I apologize for that. So I’ll wrap it up quickly: When people are speaking loose and fast in a general sense about most mainstream media and positive representation- what I’ve found them to be usually talking about is creating characters who are given the same treatment as any other character. That they’re fully developed and realized into living, breathing people and not just token ___ characters. They’re fully dimensional, just like any other character would be. And for some characters, just like for some people, it is a bigger part of their lives, they put more weight on that aspect of themself. But… for others, it’s not as big. Doesn’t make them any less, doesn’t make them any more, it’s just what they prioritize. Because, just like any other person, and any other character, each has something different that they care about.

I, uh, don’t know how much sense that made. But I hope at least some of it was coherent. :sweat_smile:

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155

Okay, maybe I was too pesimistic in my portrayal. But I felt it was hard the way I was treated without even read the content. Probably because my way of expressing things.

I understand that Is something that affects people. And It has to be addressed , That’s why I asked in first place. I decide change it and is better that way. Because i wanted portrait positively impact community. Sometimes that is made back track and listening the community you want to support

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156

I don’t want to start an argument, and I do want to continue to emphasize that I think everyone should be pretty happy with where that conversation ended up because you did improve your quality of representation and that’s great, but we weren’t treating you too hard.

You provided a summary of what your game included, and people responded really politely to that, even though–as was already stated–it made a lot of us really uncomfortable. That isn’t your fault! You were doing your best to start out with, and that’s great, but then when you asked for input on your portrayal you also pushed back against valid, polite, clear criticisms. We were responding to what you put forward, exactly the way you asked us to.

Like I said earlier, it’s important to ask for sensitivity readers but it’s also really important to listen to them and realize that they probably aren’t being as harsh as you might feel like they are. It’s sensitive, important stuff, and creators as a whole really need to be better about not getting hurt when they accidentally do offensive things and have that expressed to them.

I’m really glad that you’re taking good lessons from it and I’m glad things are moving forward a lot better, but if you look back on that discussion and remember the trans people you were talking to as being rude or harsh or threatening, instead of thinking about how they helped you make a better, more inclusive story, then you’re taking away the wrong lesson.

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157

Sorry, but this part confuses me a little bit, I am not entirely sure I understand.

Are you saying that featuring bigoted characters might condone those behaviours? or are you saying something more like the portrayal of bigots can be used to provide a helpful message as well as it can create a harmful one?

Or maybe you are not trying to say anything like that and I’m just misunderstanding you completely. But I ask because I honestly want to know more about this issue.

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158

I don’t say the people of the tread was bad. It was the people NOT in it. I mean I didn’t love hear I was doing something wrong. But I deserve it. Because I was being a moron. Another thing is when I received emails . So i should emphasize that here community was trully great and patience.
However, sometimes some people is not in forum now take some bold measures as sending menacing mails

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People that want to “start a conversation on LGBT issues” generally mean to say that they want bigoted characters and (usually) for those bigoted characters to be “good people, just a little bigoted”.

The idea that being a bigot does not make you a bad person, obviously implies (and normalizes the idea that) bigotry is not a bad thing.

Edit: There are exceptions to the rule, but they are less common than the rule itself.

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160

I am just thinking if vigotry and hatred could been seen as a Curse as an illness that become humans in monsters. It hasn’t be because transphobic, or machist or homophobic. Each time a person pre judge someone else because a stupid thing. Is being less human.

@RETowers And what if Vigotry are really bad people who because they bad karma become monsters? Is that okay?

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I see, Do you think that portraying bigoted character in a negative way can be a good thing, then?

Like for example when a characters that starts as a bigot is able to grown and learn over time? because I might be a fan of some of those stories.

Anyway, thanks for clarifying, I know I can be a little annoying with my questions sometimes.

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162

I am annoying too. But I think is good asking. Is the only way to get better. I learned a lot of things that makes me wondering. And here community is ratter positive

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163

It’s not necessarily the same, but in Dragon Age: Origins, if you’re playing as an elf, you can have a conversation with a companion (Leliana) where she says something kind of offensive–I can’t remember exactly what, I think something along the lines of “in my home country elves are prized as helpers/servants because you’re all so attractive”, and you can respond “wow that’s super offensive” (I’m paraphrasing) and she’ll respond (again, paraphrasing) “Oh, I didn’t know that, I’m so sorry” and you gain approval points from her and she comes out the other end more aware.

I think that’s about the best way to handle it–the thing is, by including bigoted characters with the idea that the MC (whether this is interactive or not) can “help them grow” or “teach them to be better,” it forces the MC and the audience to continue to interact with said character. And I think when it’s something like one or two unintentional micro-aggressions from well meaning characters who are willing to learn and change that can be solved in a two-line conversation, that’s really cool to include.

But especially for an audience that suffers that type of treatment, including too much of it–especially from characters that are supposed to be likable, it gets really tiring to have to keep interacting with it and seeing it, and while the message “people can learn” is a good one, it shouldn’t be “if you take a bunch of time and energy to interact with bigots they will eventually stop being bigots and actually be your best friend,” when the real world doesn’t really work like that. And I see messages like that a lot in media–not always with like, prejudice against minorities, but there’s a general “jerk with a heart gold” trope that can be done well or can be done in a way that sort of blames people for having enemies, if that makes sense? Like, “if you didn’t befriend the guy you don’t like that’s your own fault for not getting along with them,” which is dumb

(which might not at all be what @RETowers was talking about, but was along the lines of what I think was meant?)

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