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  1. In Memory of LAJ_FETT: Please share your remembrances and condolences HERE

Lit Ignorance is Bias: The Diversity Manifesto

Discussion in 'Literature' started by CooperTFN, Sep 2, 2012.

  1. GrandAdmiralJello

    GrandAdmiralJello Comms Admin ❉ Moderator Communitatis Litterarumque star 10 Staff Member Administrator

    Registered:
    Nov 28, 2000
    Sure, I'm not avocating Victorianism or shaming here. But fanservice for me is just that -- something that's just to please the fans, and not part of the character. So someone like Black Widow, for instance, might be considered sexy as a side-effect of her traits but it's not that she was created specifically to be sexy. Or someone might simply be attractive, or get around, or dress a certain way simply for the sake of it, but that too is servicing the character rather than the fans.

    It's similar to the whole male gaze thing. The answer to the male gaze is not the female gaze. It's to stop designing things to be gazed at! People might gaze at them anyway, and I won't take away people's desires to do so, just don't make it all pandering and stuff.
     
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  2. Vthuil

    Vthuil Force Ghost star 5

    Registered:
    Jan 3, 2013
    I can agree with that. But the thing about that article is that both the word "cheesecake" (or "beefcake") and most of the specific discussion in it sound like they're referring to something more fanservicey than just "basic sexiness".
     
  3. patchworkz7

    patchworkz7 Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Mar 26, 2004

    That's actually part of the problem; Ubisoft has been horrible at explaining that it's not the MP mode they're talking about, but a mode similar to what they do in Watch Dogs which allows another player to seamlessly drop into your game (with some searching time) and they will appear as a differently costumed and slightly different facial structured male. In every player's game, they're still going to be the main character, Arno, but for the purpose of how the game works, they'll appear to others as a generic male so they don't have four Arnos running around.

    The animations, build, language, voice acting, etc to put in females was deemed to be too costly to do just for this feature.

    I'm still hoping that should they have a separate multi-player mode, as most AC's after AC2 have had, that they will have female avatars, as every game with MP has had, and AC: Liberation had a female PoC as the main protag.

    So, I don't think Ubisoft did this out of anything other than stated reasons...but their stated reasons are kinda weak and with the bloat that their games often have it would have been nice to give priority to having female avatars for the co-op mode rather than the half dozen inane in-game casual games like poker or chess or whatever that this is sure to have.

    Like Trip, the whole thing just makes me more sad than mad, mainly because Ubisoft is a company that regularly features strong females and has a history of including female avatars as well as respectfully using said females as well as PoC.
     
  4. GrandAdmiralJello

    GrandAdmiralJello Comms Admin ❉ Moderator Communitatis Litterarumque star 10 Staff Member Administrator

    Registered:
    Nov 28, 2000
    What they should have said "because you're Arno on your end, it wouldn't make sense to play a female because the only people who would see you as female are people who are not you."

    Instead, they gave technical reasons which I don't think are true at all. Because yes, it's not MP -- but the MP character is identical to the SP characters anim-wise. And yeah, given feature creep in the AC games, deciding to spend resources on random stuff and not this is also aggravating.

    it shows their priorities.
     
  5. patchworkz7

    patchworkz7 Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Mar 26, 2004

    I'm constantly surprised/saddened by some of the statements and press releases that professionals and large companies that should know better allow to go out the door.

    That statement that Ubisoft made was just horrible, and as someone with a passing history and interest in public relations and release statements it's poorly worded, poorly written, and it is just...offensive. Offensive in the sense that it makes it seem like they don't understand what the question or concern was, as well as sticking the boilerplate corporate disclaimer about diversity on the front of the message...I mean, it's like a "How Not To.." seminar all in itself.

    Not unlike Disney putting out the "cast" photo for the new movie while the cast hadn't been finalized.

    It boggles my mind that these things pass people who probably should know better, unless things are worse than I think and no one is really paying attention and someone just hacked out a statement after asking an engineer why they didn't have women in. Even if that WAS the issue, it's not how you tell it to the public.

    Also, I still don't know if this game will have a separate MP mode or if this is just co-op, and knowing that factor would have changed the public opinion they could have said something like; "Due to limitations we wanted to focus on bringing an array of female avatars to our multiplayer option rather than using resources on the co-op, as in MP we can highlight the extensive backstories and work we put into all our characters, including our female ones, and so we hope fans look forward to having a large selection of diverse male and female avatars in the multiplayer mode while enjoying playing as Arno in a co-op capacity with friends."

    That's off the top of my head, but I think it (and it assume MP mode) is a helluva lot less dismissive to the problem than what Ubisoft actually said.
     
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  6. Cynical_Ben

    Cynical_Ben Force Ghost star 4

    Registered:
    Aug 12, 2013
    Part of the problem I see, Patch, is that big production companies, for pretty much every kind of media, don't like to be scooped by leaks and have their project weighed down by rumors brought on by half-truths and misunderstandings, understandably so. In response, they like to put out the official word on this or that matter before they've really thought through everything they're saying or everything that might be asked or issues that might be raised about what they say. The more damning fact is that neither Ubisoft nor Disney apparently saw complaints about the lack of female representation coming, or at least disregarded their possible coming as being unimportant.
     
  7. Vthuil

    Vthuil Force Ghost star 5

    Registered:
    Jan 3, 2013
    That's hardly a defense. You'd really think that at least some people in this day and age - particularly ones who actually have tried to make diversity a priority in the past - wouldn't have to think through why this sort of thing is problematic.
     
  8. CooperTFN

    CooperTFN TFN EU Staff Emeritus star 7 VIP

    Registered:
    Jul 8, 1999
    Well I'll grant that part of that is just me being provocative. :p

    But really, what I said before isn't to say that that's the only way to express overt sex appeal IMO--and the article is very specifically talking about pinup art like the Imperial Recruitment posters. Those absolutely fall under the banner of cheesecake, but I don't think I'd call them fanservice because they're wholly original characters and there's IU precedent for that kind of thing existing (also it's troublingly close to equating "fan" with "male"). The Leia fan art at the top of the piece is a harder call; obviously it's completely out of character and I wouldn't want to see Leia portrayed that way in a story. But I think IU in a war context it's believable that Rebel soldiers would be passing around stuff along those lines, and I just have trouble being abjectly opposed to it as a phenomenon because it adds verisimilitude and helps to the counter the "children's franchise" elements. Like I said, I'd just prefer it be more equitable--I don't think the female gaze is the solution, but I think it's part of the solution.
     
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  9. GrandAdmiralJello

    GrandAdmiralJello Comms Admin ❉ Moderator Communitatis Litterarumque star 10 Staff Member Administrator

    Registered:
    Nov 28, 2000
    As stupid as those posters are, I have less of a problem with them as compared to say fan service illustrations in comics.


    Though I do have a patriotic objection to those posters.


    Missa ab iPhona mea est.
     
  10. CooperTFN

    CooperTFN TFN EU Staff Emeritus star 7 VIP

    Registered:
    Jul 8, 1999
    I was talking to Nanci on Twitter about maybe doing a follow-up on Legacy specifically. I think there's a lot to unpack in Darth Talon alone; on the one hand a more cheesecake character design there never was, but all things considered I think she was written very strongly and not as just Evil Sexpot #5.
     
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  11. Zorrixor

    Zorrixor Chosen One star 6

    Registered:
    Sep 8, 2004
    And then the Imperial troops could have been doing the same with pin-ups of that cutie, Admiral Daala. :p
     
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  12. Gorefiend

    Gorefiend Chosen One star 5

    Registered:
    Oct 23, 2004

    Once more Tavira would just be the better choice as in just about everything else. ;)

    Though Leg was also nice enough to cater to those who are more inclined towards the male physique. :)
     
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  13. CooperTFN

    CooperTFN TFN EU Staff Emeritus star 7 VIP

    Registered:
    Jul 8, 1999
  14. Gamiel

    Gamiel Chosen One star 9

    Registered:
    Dec 16, 2012
    If you are going to do that can you please also point notice to that all the female Devaronians we see are shaved.
     
  15. Zorrixor

    Zorrixor Chosen One star 6

    Registered:
    Sep 8, 2004
    Well, there was once this image:

    [​IMG]

    ...which I honestly always preferred much more than the shaved heads we got in the comics.

    Although I've never thought about it before, it was actually rather interesting how in that image you had the usual male-female contrast of the male having more fur being reversed, with the female clearly having much more fur, and the male the hairless one.
     
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  16. CooperTFN

    CooperTFN TFN EU Staff Emeritus star 7 VIP

    Registered:
    Jul 8, 1999
    I wouldn't mind seeing more females look like that picture, but I'm inclined to cut Duursema some slack on that one because she came of age as an artist in the days when Nightcrawler was supposed to be fuzzy and just got drawn as if he was blue-skinned. I think she's conscious of what they would "really" look like, she just tends to not do that kind of detail on characters that are only lightly-furred. That none of hers tend to have the full muttonchop deal may stand out, but it's within the realm of artictic license, I think.
     
  17. Gamiel

    Gamiel Chosen One star 9

    Registered:
    Dec 16, 2012
    Please read the discussion on Legacy’s representation that begins here and goes on for two pages and then come back to me:)
     
  18. GrandAdmiralJello

    GrandAdmiralJello Comms Admin ❉ Moderator Communitatis Litterarumque star 10 Staff Member Administrator

    Registered:
    Nov 28, 2000
    Speaking of dirty aliens, the Rodians in Jedi Academy had some pretty awesome outfits. They were all male for some reason, but they beat basically everybody else in the style department.


    I don't know what this has to do with anything, but this is one of the only times I'll say something nice about aliens, so take note. :p


    Missa ab iPhona mea est.
     
  19. CooperTFN

    CooperTFN TFN EU Staff Emeritus star 7 VIP

    Registered:
    Jul 8, 1999
    Gami, your feelings on the subject are known to me. :)

    I don't even disagree exactly, I'm just not as bothered by it as you are.
     
  20. Gamiel

    Gamiel Chosen One star 9

    Registered:
    Dec 16, 2012
    The problem is that Nightcrawler have fine fur while female Devaronians are suposed to have thick fur. So they should be drawn more like Beast then Nightcrawler.

    More this
    [​IMG]

    then this
    [​IMG][​IMG]

    Also: either the wook' need to ad black to the possible fur colours for Devaronians or Sanya and Maladi colour their scalp fur
     
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  21. Zorrixor

    Zorrixor Chosen One star 6

    Registered:
    Sep 8, 2004
    Wow, that first image is awesome.
     
  22. GrandAdmiralJello

    GrandAdmiralJello Comms Admin ❉ Moderator Communitatis Litterarumque star 10 Staff Member Administrator

    Registered:
    Nov 28, 2000
    It's alright, but there's some Devaronian standing in the way.


    Missa ab iPhona mea est.
     
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  23. Vthuil

    Vthuil Force Ghost star 5

    Registered:
    Jan 3, 2013
    Darth Talon actually strikes me as a good example of the sort of thing I was referring to earlier when I said that excessive 'cake fanservice can be damaging to a character. Her characterization isn't really sexualized at all (she does have a fling with Cade, but it was more a Dark Side thing than anything else and anyway "had a fling with Cade" isn't a very exclusive category), but an awful lot of fan reaction is mainly focused on her appearance.
     
  24. Gamiel

    Gamiel Chosen One star 9

    Registered:
    Dec 16, 2012
    Do you think that if she had been male and dressed the same people would still have complained?
     
  25. CooperTFN

    CooperTFN TFN EU Staff Emeritus star 7 VIP

    Registered:
    Jul 8, 1999
    Yeah, I can't fault you for that, V, but I just disagree. It's a big galaxy and I like that not everybody has 20th-century-American modesty standards. She's absolutely a deliberately sexy character, but as long as she's characterized well (and furthermore, as long as the men are handled along similar lines), that's fine with me. The fact that a certain segment of fandom is going to be obnoxious about that is their problem, not hers.
     
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