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[Vector]

Asides count.  Any dialogue between two named female characters that isn't about a guy.

[Neonivek]

Asides count.  Any dialogue between two named female characters that isn't about a guy.

Well then, lets absolutely apply this then!

Mostly for fun.

[Pnx]

It is more PNX since I edited what I said like crazy.

That the Bechdel Test is more of an inductive test. As in the conclusion you come up with is "The ratio of passes and fails indictates a strong possibility of sexism" But it will never say "The ratio of passes and fails indicates sexism".

It doesn't possess the accuracy in my mind for a deductive conclusion, while possessing more then enough for an inductive one.

Since the easiest way to show the wage gaps to show outright racism is simply to show them doing the same amount of work and their pay.

No, I disagree on that one, I think you're not looking at things in the same light as me. I mean any employer that pays that employed black people and pays them less than what a typical white person gets could probably cite a whole list of perfectly good non-race related reasons, like a lack of good experience, or they had a poor college, or just say something about their work ethic or attitude being bad.

Similarly the same can be said for screenplay writers and movie directors. They could cite a lot of reasons why women don't get the same level of presence and story as men do in their works. Like how it's reality that most important positions are filled by men, that most soldiers or X professionals are male, or any number of other things to excuse the gender bias in their movie.

It doesn't necessarily mean the person in question is being consciously racist/sexist, but it does indicate a certain level of sexism/racism in the system.

[Neonivek]

No, I disagree on that one, I think you're not looking at things in the same light as me. I mean any employer that pays that employed black people and pays them less than what a typical white person gets could probably cite a whole list of perfectly good non-race related reasons, like a lack of good experience, or they had a poor college, or just say something about their work ethic or attitude being bad.

So then you agree. Since a "I have a reason why that may not be true" is not something you can wage against a deductive conclusion.

it does indicate a certain level of sexism/racism in the system.

It indicates the strong possibility for the reasons you listed above yourself. Making it an inductive conclusion.

Inductive doesn't mean "weak" for example psychology is inductive deals a lot with inductive reasoning when analyzing someone.

Though Indicate is starting to have a double meaning here... In fact can I ask for your definition because I noticed that indicate can mean
1) To hint, highlight, or illuminate
and
2) To show or demonstrate

[penguinofhonor]

Can you really not think of a lot of movies that pass the neutral Bechdel test?

Think of any movie where an object features prominently in the plot and someone describes it or its powers, or where a new world is revealed to a character and another one explains it to them (or someone discovers magic or something similar), or any movie where there's a heist and people discuss the plans to steal the diamond (or discuss the diamond itself), or any movie where there's some weird sci-fi stuff going on and a scientist explains how it works.

Even Sharknado would pass this, and that movie has no character depth to speak of.

[Neonivek]

Can you really not think of a lot of movies that pass the neutral Bechdel test?

But can you think of one that fails?

[Rolan7]

Would a conversation where a woman as an aside says "These dishes aren't clean" to another woman count as a conversation not about men?

It does, actually.  That's why it's so scary that the Bechdel test is seldom passed.

This.  This happens all the time on the Bechdel test web site, which has a slightly different icon for "pass, but dubious".  They admit when thing's pass on a technicality.  The porn someone mentioned earlier wouldn't even be dubious since it was two women having an actual conversation about sports or whatever...  Here's an example of a dubious pass:
http://bechdeltest.com/view/4259/world_war_z/

The conversations are just young girls talking talking to each other and a specific woman, so it can be argued that no two women have a conversation (the conversations are always really brief apparently, but that doesn't matter).  Is it kinda weird that a disaster movie doesn't have two adult women speak to each other about the disaster in question?  Yeah, but it technically passes kinda.  They stretch the rules to pass movies because so many movies *still fail unquestionably*.  They don't need to pad the results, it's more effective to be generous to avoid criticism.  Not it stops people from misunderstanding and doubting the test anyway...

Your neutral test could be interesting I guess.  I wouldn't call it a variant of the Bechdel test though, it's too far removed.  Much more relevant is comparing the results of the Bechdel test to the reverse Bechdel test. 

[Pnx]

No, I disagree on that one, I think you're not looking at things in the same light as me. I mean any employer that pays that employed black people and pays them less than what a typical white person gets could probably cite a whole list of perfectly good non-race related reasons, like a lack of good experience, or they had a poor college, or just say something about their work ethic or attitude being bad.

So then you agree. Since a "I have a reason why that may not be true" is not something you can wage against a deductive conclusion.

Well, in reality it is, because we're all pretty flawed and tend to overlook possibilities, which is reasonable because we live in a world of practically infinite possibilities. Or if someone has eliminated a possibility you can poke holes in the process they used to eliminate it. Nobody ever uses perfect deductive reasoning, it's too frigging hard.

Also you've kind of failed to make the point that if one argument is inductive the other isn't. Which as I recall was the basis of your whole "they're different things" argument.

[penguinofhonor]

Can you really not think of a lot of movies that pass the neutral Bechdel test?

But can you think of one that fails?

The Princess and the Frog, though I may have gotten that answer from you saying it a minute ago.

[Neonivek]

Much more relevant is comparing the results of the Bechdel test to the reverse Bechdel test

There are a lot of ways you can do it... For example Equal Ground Bechdel and Reverse Bechdels (Equal male to female characters of relevance)

Or movies with at least 4 female main characters Bechdel test... and 4 male main characters Reverse Bechdel.

Mind you, there would be a lot less of a significant margin, but frankly anything to get away from the HUGE SWAY of "One female movies" and "Two unimportant female movies" so I can get some interesting results.

Why would it be interesting? Because I feel they would more accurately show how female characters are often used even when there are a lot of them.

The Princess and the Frog, though I may have gotten that answer from you saying it a minute ago.

Mind you in that case I was applying that even the conversations about food was "I can use this food to get a man"

Also you've kind of failed to make the point that if one argument is inductive the other isn't.

They are both.

Though if I failed, ohh well. I don't really have any other way to explain or argue that point so I'll concede.

[Rolan7]

Why would you make two separate samples with such weird requirements?
Though interestingly, seems to me that far more shows have 4 male leads than 4 female ones.  So the samples wouldn't be of comparable size even.

It's not a complicated test... "Equal Ground Bechdel and Reverse Bechdels" isn't a thing (no Google results for "Equal Ground Bechdel") and it makes no sense to me.  If you mean a form of the Bechdel test where a movie needs "Equal male to female characters of relevance" to pass, I'm going to give up... A test of that sort would again have nothing to do with the existing, simple, terrifying Bechdel test.

[Pnx]

Also you've kind of failed to make the point that if one argument is inductive the other isn't.

They are both.

Though if I failed, ohh well. I don't really have any other way to explain or argue that point so I'll concede.

Well yeah, I mean nobody in real life ever uses only deductive or inductive reasoning. The only people that ever try to do that are people in crappy crime dramas. The real world just doesn't operate on the kind of perfect logic necessary to make it work...

Well ok, I'm actually pretty sure it does, it's just that the real world is so complex that we mere mortals take a few bloody shortcuts to help us deal with it all, which leads to issues with the logic of our thinking sometimes because really we're making guesses based off a bunch of conclusions that (if we're good at it), make our guesses typically pretty accurate (though not always).

I'm also starting to become a little bit frustrated here but, I'm starting to feel like you're shitting people around again in an attempt to get people to come to a realisation that everyone with a bit of common sense had absolutely ages ago.

[Neonivek]

Ok I thought of a great comparison to make.

Bechdel Tests Men Versus Women... Only with movies where the main character is the same gender as the test.

I mean, I know that Alien and Titanic are "Female main character" and Alien fails I think (I cannot remember).

A test of that sort would again have nothing to do with the existing, simple, terrifying Bechdel test.

Hardly. I'll give you a hint... Even though there would be a lot of female characters, they would still fail the test more often then the male counterpart "IF" the test holds up. (Who knows... Maybe the Reverse Bechdel test will have more fails)

If you apply things in a straight forward manner you are always going to find the same information... and often those differences are where the real information lies.

For example... What kind of movies involve 4 female main characters? There are two I can think of on the top of my head.
1) Movies aimed towards women about a group of women
2) Movies aimed towards men about a harem of women (The anime definition of Harem)

"I'm starting to feel like you're shitting people around again in an attempt to get people to come to a realisation that everyone with a bit of common sense had absolutely ages ago"

No you are completely off. That wasn't my intent at all.

[alexandertnt]

*reads last few pages*

Im so confused...

[Neonivek]

*reads last few pages*

Im so confused...

Well ok... let me see...

I thought of a Neutral Bechdel Test for fun. Arguments happened... The arguments didn't go anywhere. Then I proposed an new possible test for fun.

That is all that occurred.