Diversity Representation in MU*ing
-
@HelloProject said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:
Also on the topic of banning races for there being "too much" of them, can we talk about how so many MUSHes have treated Asian culture like a weird trend that they have to ban or restrict? Like yeah, I get that there's people who do unfortunately bad portrayals of shit, but I can't be the only one who has seen MUSHes literally put Asian characters on a restricted list.
I don't ban asian characters, or restrict them (save in like, a rare few fantasy settings where they literally are on another continent and I'm planning a First Contact type situation later).
What I will ban the fuck out of is your anime samurai ninja master dragon lady concept that just so happens to be east asian because that shit usually goes well outside the theme of what I want to run.
Few people seem to be able to differentiate between the two, however. I didn't restrict your asian character, I restricted your weird-ass concept that happens to have asian stereotype culture tags just slapped on it.
#SorryNotSorry
Also, not you you as in @HelloProject, the general, nebulous you that refers to no one in particular.
Racism isn't Tinkerbell. It doesn't need you to believe in it for it to exist.
-
Sure, and some people genuinely think that sexism is scientifically supported. Some people are wrong and should be mocked and have their toxic ideologies driven out of society.
-
@Derp said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:
I didn't restrict your asian character, I restricted your weird-ass concept that happens to have asian stereotype culture tags just slapped on it.
Unfortunately, that's about 90% of the Asian character concepts I've seen about. That and all persons from
middlecentral and south America are gang bangers with as loose a grasp on civility as is possible, etc, etc. And not all of those are caught in the CG process.Not to excuse the outright banning of 'Asian' characters, but I can certainly understand why people would get sick and tired of stealth-shitty concepts sneaking through so just put a strongly-worded moratorium on them entirely.
-
@Tinuviel said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:
To many shitty people, sexuality and gender identity aren't who people are. They're choices being made.
I'm not saying that's how Pandora views it, just that it's hardly outside the realm of possibility.
I'm definitely a shitty person for plenty of reasons, but not this particular one, alas. I'm a lesbian despite the actual, meaningful inconvenience that can be sometimes; if I could choose to be bi or pan I would, so I know very well it's not a choice being made.
I explicitly said 'men' and 'people socialized as male', which clearly isn't saying 'anyone socialized as male is a man' or I'd have just said men. Non-binary, genderqueer, genderflexible, trans, agender people exist, and some have male socialization, and some play lesbians without a lot of regard for female socialization differences, and that's not been great for lesbian representation on games and it's hardly hating or fearing trans people to say so.
If that's not good enough, do carry on with the castigation if necessary, but I've always felt it best to be really honest here, even if I am being collectively shouted at about it, again.
Tinuviel about 9 hours ago
I hate you with the power of a thousand Pandoras. -
@Derp said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:
@HelloProject said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:
Also on the topic of banning races for there being "too much" of them, can we talk about how so many MUSHes have treated Asian culture like a weird trend that they have to ban or restrict? Like yeah, I get that there's people who do unfortunately bad portrayals of shit, but I can't be the only one who has seen MUSHes literally put Asian characters on a restricted list.
I don't ban asian characters, or restrict them (save in like, a rare few fantasy settings where they literally are on another continent and I'm planning a First Contact type situation later).
What I will ban the fuck out of is your anime samurai ninja master dragon lady concept that just so happens to be east asian because that shit usually goes well outside the theme of what I want to run.
Few people seem to be able to differentiate between the two, however. I didn't restrict your asian character, I restricted your weird-ass concept that happens to have asian stereotype culture tags just slapped on it.
#SorryNotSorry
Also, not you you as in @HelloProject, the general, nebulous you that refers to no one in particular.
A shitty concept is a shitty concept, ultimately. Granted, I frequently love to do concepts that are basically person from fantasy African country, either futuristically or feudally, because I like exploring fantasy in a way that I don't normally see explored or get to explore.
Buuuut I can imagine that what you're saying is a bit different from what I sometimes like to do, as I have 100% seen people app Asian characters in modern day New York who have dyed hair and carry a katana around everywhere with them, like pretty much every American pop culture thing that has an Asian. But yeah, I do think it is important to remember that there is a fine line that can be very contextual.
Like, for example, I just started watching Star Trek: TNG from the beginning. I've seen scattered episodes for literally my entire life, but I'm trying to properly watch it chronologically now. But there is one episode that, while I won't necessarily call it problematic, as it definitely tries to be clear that the culture itself is not inherently bad, it's just this one guy that's shitty, it does walk on a very thin line where I'm like "I don't know, it's at least a little shitty".
It felt a bit like a barbarians in space stereotype on a planet that happens to almost entirely be black people, even though the narrative tries to go out of its way to explain that they are of equal civilization level to the Federation. Like, the effort was there, and it was the early 90s so I'm not gonna be like "omg TNG is cancelled for not being perfect", but I don't think I'd necessarily be happy with that guy as a MUSH concept. African space king whose culture seems coded as technologically advanced but socially backwards... yikes.
Meanwhile, compare it to the recent Black Panther movie, and Wakanda. Pretty much the same basic setup except without all the icky yikes feelings and weird cultural implications. It's like, it's fantasy black people that lean into African cultural things, and doesn't make it seem like they're a backwards "other" compared to the white Americans. Lmao in fact the one time their being socially advanced is called into question is by the African-American villain who was abandoned by them, and he made actually good points even though he was pretty fucking deranged in how he went about making those points. Kilmonger was unquestionably a villain, but his existence didn't paint either Wakandans or African-Americans are inherently bad or backwards society, they all kind of had good points for their various perspectives.
But yeah, I'm not trying to debate or anything, mostly just throwing out there that sometimes people are genuinely trying to explore their own cultural shit in a fantastical way. But sometimes they're doing something super shitty, which is sometimes apparent right from the app itself. But sometimes you just gotta let somebody sink or swim if it isn't 100% clear.
Edit: Some may not realize that I am basically a hardcore weeb whose MSB name is literally a Japanese idol company. I just wanted to say that for full disclosure, as I never want people to miss a chance to see any irony.
-
@Pandora said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:
Non-binary, genderqueer, genderflexible, trans, agender people exist, and some have male socialization, and some play lesbians without a lot of regard for female socialization differences, and that's not been great for lesbian representation on games and it's hardly hating or fearing trans people to say so.
See it would have legitimately been better to just lead with this instead of dancing around the point, because then I could have just said "you mean it's not great for cis lesbian representation since trans lesbians exist."
Because, yeah, the experiences of trans lesbians are often really different from the experiences of cis ones.
-
@Pandora said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:
I explicitly said 'men' and 'people socialized as male', which clearly isn't saying 'anyone socialized as male is a man' or I'd have just said men.
Yeah, but you sure did seem to conflate them when you said this:
@Pandora said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:
@Rinel said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:
My point is that "male socialized" people playing lesbians isn't necessarily a cause of poor lesbian representation, since lesbians with that alleged quality exist. It's like saying "a lot of redheads play lesbians; lesbian representation isn't great."
I'm not going to lie and start saying that men playing lesbians hasn't been terrible for lesbian representation because it's now not PC to say something that's been true forever and will continue to be true forever. If it doesn't apply to you/someone you know/someone you've heard of, that's great and I'm not debating it.
Just sayin.
-
@Rinel said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:
@Pandora said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:
Non-binary, genderqueer, genderflexible, trans, agender people exist, and some have male socialization, and some play lesbians without a lot of regard for female socialization differences, and that's not been great for lesbian representation on games and it's hardly hating or fearing trans people to say so.
See it would have legitimately been better to just lead with this instead of dancing around the point, because then I could have just said "you mean it's not great for cis lesbian representation since trans lesbians exist."
Because, yeah, the experiences of trans lesbians are often really different from the experiences of cis ones.
I didn't dance around any points, I said what I said and you chose the most uncharitable interpretation possible and that's just a day ending in Y on the internet.
@GreenFlashlight That was tackling the pretty uncontentious part of what I'd said, I left 'male socialization' out because I wanted to talk about lesbian representation being diluted by men for years & that being something we've talked about forever, versus the newer mainstream coming to terms with people socialized as male who no longer identify (or never identified) as men.
Spellcheck is telling me 'uncontentious' is not a word and it's stressing me out.
Tinuviel about 9 hours ago
I hate you with the power of a thousand Pandoras. -
@Pandora said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:
@Rinel said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:
@Pandora said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:
Non-binary, genderqueer, genderflexible, trans, agender people exist, and some have male socialization, and some play lesbians without a lot of regard for female socialization differences, and that's not been great for lesbian representation on games and it's hardly hating or fearing trans people to say so.
See it would have legitimately been better to just lead with this instead of dancing around the point, because then I could have just said "you mean it's not great for cis lesbian representation since trans lesbians exist."
Because, yeah, the experiences of trans lesbians are often really different from the experiences of cis ones.
I didn't dance around any points, I said what I said and you chose the most uncharitable interpretation possible and that's just a day ending in Y on the internet.
@GreenFlashlight That was tackling the pretty uncontentious part of what I'd said, I left 'male socialization' out because I wanted to talk about lesbian representation being diluted by men for years & that being something we've talked about forever, versus the newer mainstream coming to terms with people socialized as male who no longer identify (or never identified) as men.
Spellcheck is telling me 'uncontentious' is not a word and it's stressing me out.
In modern terms, "male socialization" has become a pretty strong TERF dogwhistle. With the way that you responded to Rinel with being dodgy in your responses, on top of the use of that term, it was kind of hard to come to any other conclusion.
Like, if you didn't understand this and it was a genuine misunderstanding, I'm explaining it now so that you understand how people might take that. Unfortunately language and other things tend to shift in a certain way once very shitty people co-opts and weaponizes it against other people. And the way that you wrote things, and how you responded after, it seemed like a pretty contextually sound conclusion that you had some TERFy intent, especially since they tend to be squirrelly about what they're actually trying to say.
See: Literally everything JK Rowling said for like the whole of last month.
Edit: This post is not me calling you a TERF in this moment, I'm only trying to explain how other people saw things (Including me).
-
So dog whistles are supposed to be things that only people in the know or people opposing those people actively would know about.
By definition, your general populace wouldn't know the difference between a dog whistle and code language used by criminals. Yes I'd like to buy some roses, two tulips, and some lilies. The ATF now kicks in my door because they think I just placed an order for illegal firearms where roses are, I don't know, automatic weapons, tulips are handguns, and lilies are grenades!
Then you have fake dog whistles! Like the OK hand sign that was a 4chan troll that then started being used for realsies. So then it became real... but no one would ever think it was one until seeing it reported and even when it was on the news you're like really? The ok hand sign? I mean I guess, but it seems super improbable. Lo and behold it winds up being used unironically for that purpose (eventually).
-
@Pandora said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:
@GreenFlashlight That was tackling the pretty uncontentious part of what I'd said, I left 'male socialization' out because I wanted to talk about lesbian representation being diluted by men for years & that being something we've talked about forever, versus the newer mainstream coming to terms with people socialized as male who no longer identify (or never identified) as men.
Fair enough. I withdraw my dispute with that bit.
Spellcheck is telling me 'uncontentious' is not a word and it's stressing me out.
Same with me and "undisprovable."
-
@HelloProject I don't police anyone's thoughts. If words that describe reality, like 'male socialization' that don't really have linguistic alternatives that would A) mean the exact same thing & B) not be seen as equally problematic - are verboten, we can't really discuss diversity and representation of lesbians and that bothers me because...
@Rinel I'm not trying to pick a fight here, but when you divide the line, in text-based gaming, between trans/not-trans lesbian representation, you are ignoring the fact that men who play lesbians are almost universally not playing trans characters, they are speaking for and over female-socialized lesbians.
As one result, you see almost no butch/stud lesbians in MU*s (And I mean masc-presenting lesbians, not aggressive lipstick lesbians) because it's easier to just play a man and date women that aren't played like a temporary respite from watching porn.
It would be, in my opinion which you may disagree with, a disservice to trans people playing lesbians to say 'Let's lump you in with the lesbians played by men because that's easier/safer than talking about "mesbians" as their own problematic category'. I know problematic is a trite word these days, but work with me here.
Tinuviel about 9 hours ago
I hate you with the power of a thousand Pandoras. -
Well, we've gone a bit beyond my depth in terms of being able to talk about this topic without me fucking it up, so I'll just see what Rinel says.
-
@Pandora said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:
@Rinel I'm not trying to pick a fight here, but when you divide the line, in text-based gaming, between trans/not-trans lesbian representation, you are ignoring the fact that men who play lesbians are almost universally not playing trans characters, they are speaking for and over female-socialized lesbians.
I don't know why men playing lesbians should be expected to play trans lesbians instead of cis lesbians. The ways in which cis lesbians and trans lesbians differ is not something that means a man is more suited to play one over the other except in perhaps the most basic and vulgar concepts of anatomy, assuming you have a trans woman who has yet to begin any form of physical transition.
That is what I keep harping on in this discussion with you: trans woman does not mean "basically a man." Trans women are not proto-women, or somewhere in between men and women.
@Pandora said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:
It would be, in my opinion which you may disagree with, a disservice to trans people playing lesbians to say 'Let's lump you in with the lesbians played by men because that's easier/safer than talking about "mesbians" as their own problematic category'. I know problematic is a trite word these days, but work with me here.
I think it's a disservice to trans people playing lesbians to act as though their "male socialization" leads them to RP lesbians in a way similar to men, which is what you're implying here with your comments about "male socialization" leading to sexually aggressive hyper femme lesbians.
ETA: @Pandora said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:
I didn't dance around any points, I said what I said and you chose the most uncharitable interpretation possible
Trust me, my giving someone who uses the phrase male socialization any posts, much less three, in which to explain themselves is basically Christmas when it comes to charity.
-
@Rinel said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:
@Pandora said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:
@Rinel I'm not trying to pick a fight here, but when you divide the line, in text-based gaming, between trans/not-trans lesbian representation, you are ignoring the fact that men who play lesbians are almost universally not playing trans characters, they are speaking for and over female-socialized lesbians.
I don't know why men playing lesbians should be expected to play trans lesbians instead of cis lesbians. The ways in which cis lesbians and trans lesbians differ is not something that means a man is more suited to play one over the other except in perhaps the most basic and vulgar concepts of anatomy, assuming you have a trans woman who has yet to begin any form of physical transition.
I in no way implied that men should play trans lesbians, and in fact I think that could actually make things worse. I said they don't. The fact that "No, everything is fine and not liking the way lesbians are represented in games is dogwhistle terfery" is the response here leads me to believe that lesbians don't get a voice in lesbian diversity representation unless they're trans, and that's disturbing.
-
@Pandora said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:
The fact that "No, everything is fine and not liking the way lesbians are represented in games is dogwhistle terfery" is the response
The response I'm seeing is "why are you bringing trans women into this," not "everything is fine."
Yes, people do a poor job of roleplaying lesbians. Cis and trans lesbians have every right to talk about this. And being shoddy (at best) with your definitions by moving from "men and male socialized people" to "men" and back again is going to raise eyebrows, because casual conflation of men and trans women is a thing TERFs do.
As is claiming erasure when people push back on their nonsense, which is why
@Pandora said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:
lesbians don't get a voice in lesbian diversity representation unless they're trans, and that's disturbing.
is not only eyeroll worthy but yet another dogwhistle. You claim that you "try to be really honest here," so I don't know if you just constantly speak out of both sides of your mouth and don't realize it, are actively lying, or are simply terrible at formulating and communicating your thoughts. Because a bunch of people have had alarm bells go off when you started talking about this topic, and the fact that you're not backing down after the reasons for that have been explained to you means that you're either stupid, utterly callous, or an unrepentant bigot. Those aren't mutually exclusive, of course.
The most charitable interpretation of your posts is that you're really fucking dumb, but I've read enough of your posts since I've been here to doubt that your intellect suddenly evaporates when this particular topic arises. So I'm somewhat at a loss as to how to proceed charitably.
-
I mean I hear cis lesbians talk about diversity all the time without sounding terfy. But like the way you word things is extremely confusing. Like, it's not as if there aren't good points that you make (I've literally never seen someone play a butch lesbian in MUSHing in my entire life, which is a perfectly valid concern), but then there's other stuff that you say where, like, obviously Rinel is gonna go "well uh what do you mean by that then".
Like it's just really difficult to get clarity from you about certain things, and then it just kind of keeps going in this circle where it feels like you're avoiding giving an actual clear response to stuff, which just kind of keeps it confusing. It feels like when you respond to things you're somehow simultaneously giving shitloads of detail about what you mean while also being vague at the same time.
If I were talking about black issues and a Chinese person was like "whoa wait a minute" because I said something that sounded really questionably racist against Chinese people in the midst of me talking about black issues, I'm not gonna be like "wow I guess I can't talk about black issues now", I'm gonna instead get an understanding of either how I fucked up or where the misunderstanding happened instead of getting incredibly defensive about it, which obviously is only gonna make things worse.
I don't think a single person is disagreeing with you about lesbian issues, I literally backed off my stance on lesbian portrayals many pages ago because I'm pretty sure it was literally you who made a counterpoint that made me reconsider what I believed.
What some people are questioning, I feel, is the weird squirrelly language on the topic of trans people, in addition to the questionable male socialization thing. Like, that's the stuff that comes off as TERFy, not the talking about lesbian issues. I don't get why you would dig into being defensive about it instead of trying to get an understanding of why people are saying what they are.
-
Well. At least y'all waited until after Pride for this.
-
@HelloProject said in Diversity Representation in MU*ing:
I've literally never seen someone play a butch lesbian in MUSHing in my entire life, which is a perfectly valid concern.
Wait, is "butch" still a thing? I thought we stopped saying that years ago.
But you're right, total lack of diversity there. I've tried to play all kinds of alternative look gay women, and they never caught on.
What some people are questioning, I feel, is the weird squirrelly language on the topic of trans people, in addition to the questionable male socialization thing. Like, that's the stuff that comes off as TERFy, not the talking about lesbian issues.
Mm, to be fair, the lesbian issues thing doesn't help. It's fine on its own, but it's one of those things TERFs often bring up to muddy the issue, like women's domestic abuse shelters. I don't have a bingo yet, but that is a spot on the card, if you know what I mean.
-
Oof.
