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[Propman]

The fact that "minority" is used as a justification to be always lawful good innocent pure-pureness makes me grunge for some reason. No, it's the fact that said characters cannot be put into a negative light at all that makes me question why one would put deph into a character if said character can only be depicted in a certain way? Even if you deck a person with decent traits and flaws so as to make them a well rounded character, if a paladin can't judge the character's actions without losing his alignment, or they can't commit acts of questionable morality, or even tackle morality at all, maybe you're better off having a "bland" non-minoric character that has the ability to work beyond absolutes.

This has more to do with the inability of the test to let LBGT characters to be anything but playable good guys. And a protip: not all antagonists are evil, and the fact that all human villains have to be white, hetrosexual, and one-dimensionally evil in order to be inoffensive makes me shake my head as much as a villain who is classified as evil for being a Jihadist Stereotype in an FPS.

This of course, is a more generalized rant then anything else, though.

I guess what I'm saying is, that being LBGT shouldn't restrict a character's development as a character any more then being hetro or asexual should. If a hero makes a bunch of decisions that lead him to becoming insane in the end, being a minority of any description should not save him from the effects of his actions.

[Ogdibus]

You are missing the point completely, misrepresenting our intentions, and ignoring the social context in which the test exists.  This test is about revealing the need to broaden characterization, not make it more narrow.




Mighty Jill Off might pass.  I'm not completely sure if it should even be tested, though, because I haven't played it, and the narrative seems about as deep as Super Mario Brothers, with sexuality being their relevant traits, due to the main theme being a lesbian BDSM relationship.

[Propman]

Upon rereading the test, I seem to have confused the "1-4" numberings with the actual test itself, which is rather close to the original Barnes Test.

[Ogdibus]

Since you mentioned it, there is a very real pitfall for writers that is similar to what you were describing.  They might feel the need to overcorrect in order to be safe from accusations of bigotry.  The result can be just as you said.  Still, that's an outcome of misinterpreting the nature of the problem.  The situation is more complex than it seems upon casual inspection.

[ed boy]

I don't think that one can try and create a test for LGBT representation to mimic tests for gender representation.

When it comes to gender representation, it's easy for a character's gender to be identified because of nonprimary sexual characteristics. You can show a character with a beard, or a character with breasts, and we can deduce that that character is male or female without being shown a penis or vagina. When creating a character, nonprimary sexual characteristics are (almost) always something that is included, and it's extremely difficult to have a character that gets any substantial attention without including nonprimary sexual characteristics of that character (and by extension, gender). I believe that a large factor in why female/male representation of characters is skewed is due to the nonprimary sexual characteristics of males and females being such that the male characteristics are the ones that can be hidden/addressed more easily - that is, the leap from no sexual characteristics to male is smaller than the leap from no sexual characteristics to female.

When it comes to sexuality, then there aren't any nonprimary characteristics. Unless we're examining the character's sexual interests then the character's sexuality isn't relevant to anything. Sometimes characters are attempted to be given nonprimary characteristics of their sexuality (e.g. making a gay man extremely flamboyant) but every instance of this that I know of this is badly done. Attempting to declare a character's sexuality through nonsexual means indicates that the creator of the character is trying to make the character's sexuality relevant to something that it isn't, or that the creator feels that the inclusion of a character representing that sexuality is more important than narrative consistency. There's also a much stronger case for heterosexuality being the norm, given sexuality demographics and that for the vast majority of characters the question never has to be addressed.

I would put Dumbledore as a great example of a gay character done right. Dumbledore was an incredibly important character in the HP universe. He had a complex backstory, had interesting qualities and flaws, and had meaningful interactions with a lot of the other characters.  But most critically, of the seven books, it's not until a good portion into the last one that his sexuality is revealed. At no point did Rowling think "the readers need to know Dumbledore's gay", so the matter of his sexuality didn't come up until we were learning about his backstory and it was relevant. When it did come up, it wasn't treated as a big reveal that shocked everyone, nor was it unnecessarily referenced for the rest of the book.

If you try to examine various works of fiction to investigate the sexuality of those involved, then you run into the problem that, for the vast majority of characters, sexuality is never investigated. Typically, the only characters whose sexuality is investigated is the protagonist and the interests of the protagonist, and the protagonist is affected by a lot of factors that other characters wouldn't be - for example, making the typical consumer identify with the protagonist my making the character as similar to the consumer as possible has an enormous effect on how well the consumer appreciates that character and the work the character is in (an example is the twilight books, where the main character Bella is given extremely few identifying characteristics (I believe that this accounts for a lot of the protagonist gender skew, as "male" is seen as a lot more nondescript than "female"))

[scrdest]

The characterization in Twilight and the likes probably has much more to do with self-insertability than anything, but that's a tangent.

[palsch]

I would put Dumbledore as a great example of a gay character done right. Dumbledore was an incredibly important character in the HP universe. He had a complex backstory, had interesting qualities and flaws, and had meaningful interactions with a lot of the other characters.  But most critically, of the seven books, it's not until a good portion into the last one that his sexuality is revealed. At no point did Rowling think "the readers need to know Dumbledore's gay", so the matter of his sexuality didn't come up until we were learning about his backstory and it was relevant. When it did come up, it wasn't treated as a big reveal that shocked everyone, nor was it unnecessarily referenced for the rest of the book.

No, it was never revealed in the books. It was revealed in an interview after the final book was released. From the article;

Gay rights campaigner Peter Tatchell welcomed the news about Dumbledore and said: "It's good that children's literature includes the reality of gay people, since we exist in every society.

"But I am disappointed that she did not make Dumbledore's sexuality explicit in the Harry Potter book. Making it obvious would have sent a much more powerful message of understanding and acceptance."

Also worth noting that even the film writers were not aware until she pointed out a reference to his interest in a woman in one of the sixth movie scripts.


In any case, representation isn't about percentages or being true to life. It's about giving members of under-represented groups examples of characters who reflect them. Just because someone's personal makeup of traits only matches a few percent of the population doesn't mean they don't deserve examples of people they can relate to in the media they enjoy. The idea that 'nondescript (straight white) male' is universally relatable doesn't hold true unless you are only asking (straight white) men. This essay (part of a series which is now a book about representation in science fiction) talks about the need and hunger for fictional accounts that help give readers the tools and perspectives to start to understand themselves.

[ed boy]

The characterization in Twilight and the likes probably has much more to do with self-insertability than anything, but that's a tangent.

And the self-insertability is, I believe, a large part of why the protagonist of a work is strongly given towards heterosexual relationships.

No, it was never revealed in the books. Also worth noting that even the film writers were not aware until she pointed out a reference to his interest in a woman in one of the sixth movie scripts.

It wasn't explicitly revealed in the books, but it was implied.

In any case, representation isn't about percentages or being true to life. It's about giving members of under-represented groups examples of characters who reflect them. Just because someone's personal makeup of traits only matches a few percent of the population doesn't mean they don't deserve examples of people they can relate to in the media they enjoy.

I never said that people in minority groups don't deserve representation. I gave my thoughts on the nature of the representation (and lack thereof) and why it occurs, not expressed approval.

The idea that 'nondescript (straight white) male' is universally relatable doesn't hold true unless you are only asking (straight white) men.

The realm of concepts that are male-exclusive is far smaller than the realm of concepts that are female-exclusive. When you consider secondary and tertiary sexual characteristics, just about the only thing that is typically male-exclusive is facial hair, whereas the list of typically female-exclusive things (breasts, clothing, cosmetics, menstruation, etc) is extremely large.

[Gatleos]

I remember one of my middle school english teachers being annoyed at the "Dumbledore is Gay" reveal at the time. Not because she thought any less of the character for it, but because she didn't like the fact that it was given as supplementary information later on. Why not include it in the books?

I think the impulse when writing a gay character into a work is to point at them and say "Look what I did! It's equality!" Call it immature or whatever, but that's often the reasoning. Like I said, it's good intent that might lead to bad execution. Some writers might exclude a certain minority from their works because they fear that it might be called a negative representation no matter what they do.

But who are you to say a character isn't gay? What percentage of characters in, say, video games have some kind of explicit mention of their sexuality? Assuming they're all straight just so you can call the game out for not being gay-friendly is pretty silly. You could even call the real problem one of over-representation, because a lot of the gay characters depicted are shoehorned in for no particular reason. But what's a "good reason" to make a character's sexuality known anyway?! GAH

[acetech09]

snip

Interesting thread but Gatleos and a many others have a point.

The OP has good intentions but current application of the test declares that all characters not declared as homosexual are by default heterosexual. I'm not much for storyline games (I play Eve, KSP, DF, etc), so I can't comment on my observations in modern games, but as far as I know, a majority of games are fairly neutral towards many character's sexuality.

[palsch]

The realm of concepts that are male-exclusive is far smaller than the realm of concepts that are female-exclusive. When you consider secondary and tertiary sexual characteristics, just about the only thing that is typically male-exclusive is facial hair, whereas the list of typically female-exclusive things (breasts, clothing, cosmetics, menstruation, etc) is extremely large.

Erm, those are some very strange lists when talking about fiction, let alone video games. Something tells me not a single one of those is relevant in any video game where you may play either gender. But ignoring that...

You don't think that people who do have sex/gender/sexuality/etc specific 'features' - or, more relevantly to fiction, experiences and backgrounds - feel alienated when they don't see those experiences represented?

The realm of concepts that are male-exclusive only looks far smaller if you view the lack of features as the default rather than exclusive of those who have them. It's the inherently privileged viewpoint.

It's also the reason that explicit representation is needed. Because when straight/white/male is viewed as the default universally, being re-enforced by all media and culture people are surrounded by, and a character is not explicitly written as something different, they are going to be assumed by most readers/players/watchers to be the default.

[AlleeCat]

Here's the problem I have with most games that have homosexual or trans characters: They are almost always villains. Again, going back to that Game Theory episode, Poison from Final Fight is trans and a villain. In Metal Gear Solid, both Raikov and Volgin are interested in men, and both villains, and on top of that, Volgin is a sadist. Dr. Strangelove, also from MGS is a lesbian and a villain for most of the game, when she starts fighting on the good guys' side, it's also around that time that she starts displaying interest in a man.

When a game does come out that makes a homosexual or trans character a protagonist, it's almost always censored in English speaking countries. Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door had an MTF trans character who even got a story arc about her being accepted as a woman. In the English release, that was all taken out and replaced with her being bullied for... Being the youngest??

I'm not saying that we need more representation, I'm saying we need better representation, because those 15% of people who identify as LGBT need better role models, and the other 85% need to understand better that being gay or bi or trans isn't abnormal or freakish. I know if I had better role models for this kind of thing, I wouldn't have been so afraid of coming out when I was a kid, and I definitely wouldn't have the problems I have today.

[ed boy]

The realm of concepts that are male-exclusive is far smaller than the realm of concepts that are female-exclusive. When you consider secondary and tertiary sexual characteristics, just about the only thing that is typically male-exclusive is facial hair, whereas the list of typically female-exclusive things (breasts, clothing, cosmetics, menstruation, etc) is extremely large.

Erm, those are some very strange lists when talking about fiction, let alone video games. Something tells me not a single one of those is relevant in any video game where you may play either gender. But ignoring that...

I was thinking generic media with a slight focus on books. In a video game, I agree that such examples aren't very relevant to gender representation.

You don't think that people who do have sex/gender/sexuality/etc specific 'features' - or, more relevantly to fiction, experiences and backgrounds - feel alienated when they don't see those experiences represented?

I do, but I feel that an incomplete representation is less alienating than a misaligned representation. That is, I feel that "this represents some of my experiences, but not all" is less alienating than "This reflects some of my experiences, but not all, and things from outside my experience".

The realm of concepts that are male-exclusive only looks far smaller if you view the lack of features as the default rather than exclusive of those who have them. It's the inherently privileged viewpoint.

Changing what is considered the norm doesn't change which group of concepts is smaller than the other. Whether you consider the smaller group of concepts as the norm or the larger group of concepts as the norm, one is still smaller than the other. Privilege has nothing to do with it.

It's also the reason that explicit representation is needed. Because when straight/white/male is viewed as the default universally, being re-enforced by all media and culture people are surrounded by, and a character is not explicitly written as something different, they are going to be assumed by most readers/players/watchers to be the default.

I disagree that explicit representation is a good idea. For instance, if your goal was to include a gay character, you would need to either show them in a sexual situation (which may be very difficult to do adequately, depending on the medium) or have them declare their sexuality in some situation in which it isn't relevant, sacrificing the narrative.

As for why straight/white/male is viewed as the default, I believe that that's because the set of experiences related to being straight, white and male are mostly subsets of the alternatives. That is, if you were to try and create a character without assigning them sexuality,race or gender, the set of traits and concepts that you could assign to them would resemble a straight white male because the set of traits and concepts for other groups would include so much more that is exclusive to those groups.

Here's the problem I have with most games that have homosexual or trans characters: They are almost always villains. Again, going back to that Game Theory episode, Poison from Final Fight is trans and a villain.

In the case of poison, the character started as female, but when the game was released in america hurting women was considered too obscene, so they had to change that.

[AlleeCat]

Ah, no, Poison is trans in Japan, as well. The only difference between them is that in Japan, she's pre-op. In the US, she's post-op.

[palsch]

Changing what is considered the norm doesn't change which group of concepts is smaller than the other. Whether you consider the smaller group of concepts as the norm or the larger group of concepts as the norm, one is still smaller than the other. Privilege has nothing to do with it.
...
As for why straight/white/male is viewed as the default, I believe that that's because the set of experiences related to being straight, white and male are mostly subsets of the alternatives. That is, if you were to try and create a character without assigning them sexuality,race or gender, the set of traits and concepts that you could assign to them would resemble a straight white male because the set of traits and concepts for other groups would include so much more that is exclusive to those groups.

OK, lets look at this another way; people as video game characters. Each 'trait' is a setting with various values. Someone a particular value for a given trait is going to have a completely different experience from someone with a different value. It's not that they are the same person just with a couple extra experiences; all their experiences are through the lens of having said value. A character with the setting 'gay' is going to have a radically different storyline to a character with the setting 'straight'. Similarly someone with the settings 'gay' and 'black' is going to have a radically different storyline to someone with the setting 'gay' and 'white'. And so on. Each set of settings gives you a completely different story, crossing over with some others but alienated and separated from them by the differences.

Now we are trying to choose some base set of settings and universally label them 'normal' and 'more relatable' than other sets. Believing that straight/white/male is more relatable is to ignore all this. Having a character who is straight might make them impossible to relate to to someone who is gay. To quote another of those Invisible essays;

The truth is, science fiction and fantasy never made me feel better about myself growing up. I loved Star Wars, but when I told a classmate in third grade that I wanted to be Han Solo, he replied, “But you can’t. You have to be a jawa.” I believed him. When I was assigned to read 1984, I quietly fumed at the idea that an all-white, all-straight future is what terrified people. Meanwhile, I had been threatened with deportation, followed by the police, and was silently suffering in the conservative, homophobic environment I lived in every day. That dystopic world? I was already living in it.

Fiction that doesn't talk to the experiences of someone is going to be less relatable than fiction that does, and provide them with fewer escapist channels, perspectives, etc. Pretending that the experiences of marginalised, minority or just plain non-straight/white/male people are just the same as straight/white/male with a couple extra bits bolted on is what I mean by this being a privileged viewpoint.

It's setting the storyline where 'straight', 'white', 'male', etc are picked as cannon for future fiction based on that universe and then dismissing complaints from others whose gameplay experience was different because it's still the same game and the 'simplest' storyline, so surely they can still related to it?

I disagree that explicit representation is a good idea. For instance, if your goal was to include a gay character, you would need to either show them in a sexual situation (which may be very difficult to do adequately, depending on the medium) or have them declare their sexuality in some situation in which it isn't relevant, sacrificing the narrative.

Invisible representation is not representation. Take the Dumbledore example. He didn't serve as an example of a gay character to anyone reading the books. For him to serve as such an example you would have to be reading the books knowing what JK said in some interview months after the last one was released. It's unlikely to have served as much of an example for anyone.

Which kinda sucks? Because there are thousands of gay kids who grew up reading Harry Potter, a series that is pretty heavy on the romance elements. Nearly every main and most side characters have hetrosexual romances of some type at some point. But not a single same-sex relationship is mentioned, even in passing. And the only gay character is only known to be such by word of god after the fact. So gay kids who maybe used those books as escapism from a world that might not be friendly to them had absolutely no representation of themselves to aid that escapism.

And maybe it's not always easy to work into narratives, maybe not every gay character needs to be outed in the story, but using this as an excuse for why not a single openly gay character exists doesn't work for me. Especially when romance is so central to nearly every form of media out there.