Serenes Forest's Teehee Thread

[GuardianSing]

3 hours ago, Shrimpolaris said:

And on the whole thing:

• Reducing sexualization won't us make confront the sexist past. Treating women better and giving them rights irl does.

One of the ways of treating women better is to not treat them as sex objects in media.

Do not underestimate the influence of online media as it is the thing that ties us all together.

3 hours ago, Shrimpolaris said:

It comes across as very hypocritical to those on the line or hard to convince people when you keep talking about sexualization of women as an issue while sexualization of males is there (and increasing). Yeah whataboutism is bs, but we are just giving them reasons on a golden platter.

What is the truth is not always what is.

Context is key. Unlike men, women for most of history have been treated by those in power as baby making machines that stay at home and take care of the kids and give sex whenever asked.

When it comes to oversexualized female characters there's a sense of uneasiness and uncomfortableness that some female viewers get. I know from the women in my life that it almost feels like being taken advantage of to them

Most men on the other hand don't get this feeling as we don't have that history. If a male character is sexualized that's not too bad since it's most likely a character made by men, you can be sure that it will end being a real character. There's no feeling of being violated or exploited for another's gaze. And sure, a male character may be made sexy to attract a female audience but most men love the idea of women finding them sexy and so it rarely comes up as a conversation.

Oh and of course there are sexualized male characters in female targeted pieces of media but since our culture has a history of looking at female targeted things as "Inferior" they almost never get that famous in the public eye. The biggest non-children targeted one I can think of being Twilight which is only popular because of how mocked it is.

4 hours ago, Shrimpolaris said:

The whole "Character has to wear x" doesn't sound far of the religious dogma of people having to wear y. Like people always wanted to wear whatever they wanted, and now we are forcing them again because "sexualization"?

We don't wanna reach the point where we have to wear something as to not offend others or something again.

I agree with you, we don't want to give women the idea that they always have to be prim and proper without showing skin.

It's not so much about sexualization as it is about characterization.

I think artists should be free to design their characters however they please, the point is that a character built from the ground up to exist for the sole purpose of sex appeal, likely isn't going to be very compelling. 

[Venger_06]

Since it looks like this conversation will continue, here's an example of what I said about Zeta.

[Shrimpica]

24 minutes ago, GuardianSing said:

Most men on the other hand don't get this feeling as we don't have that history. If a male character is sexualized that's not too bad since it's most likely a character made by men, you can be sure that it will end being a real character. There's no feeling of being violated or exploited for another's gaze. And sure, a male character may be made sexy to attract a female audience but most men love the idea of women finding them sexy and so it rarely comes up as a conversation.

Ngl while i do see the point in your other points (although not necessarily agree), this part feels more like a big assumption, and assuming men like it just because they are seen as strong and masculine while males also get exploited all the time.

You aren't familiar with entertainment for girls/women, are you? Not all of it men will like as they are being gazed hungrily at and imagined in various situations.

31 minutes ago, GuardianSing said:

One of the ways of treating women better is to not treat them as sex objects in media.

You can't stop the horny (for both males and females), but you can educate people to live and deal with it.

And educate those whose minds still live in the past how to treat others better.

Going "Sex object bad" ain't improving anyones lives. And blaming it all on the past ain't the solution, either.

26 minutes ago, GuardianSing said:

I think artists should be free to design their characters however they please, the point is that a character built from the ground up to exist for the sole purpose of sex appeal, likely isn't going to be very compelling. 

I kinda agree with you.

However a character can be compelling and sexy at the same time. One does not nullify the other, and disregarding characters because of how they look is what i have a problem with.

And honestly, nothing wrong with liking a character for shallow reason (cool, pretty, badass, sexy, whatever), either.

[GuardianSing]

13 minutes ago, Shrimpolaris said:

Ngl while i do see the point in your other points (although not necessarily agree), this part feels more like a big assumption, and assuming men like it just because they are seen as strong and masculine while males also get exploited all the time.

Maybe not like it, but certainly not care for it.

But I'll grant you that I know far more women than men in my life so perhaps I only assume when most men feel. All I know is that for all the men I do know, not one (Including myself) have I see wince or scoff or complain to me about a shirtless man in a film or game.

My perception of male oppression has always been about work and emotion, that men are only valued if they can bring in money and work hard for it, without showing strong emotions. It's a big issue today how so many men feel isolated growing up in an environment where they're told "Boys don't cry" and so on, which I agree is a huge problem. Even as a male who grew up in an open happy family, these ideas still caught onto me due to how prevalent it is in our culture and it took me time to move past that.

That to me is male exploitation but if there's also a lot of male sexual exploitation then please let me know. A man who refuses to learn of unheard problems is a blind man.

28 minutes ago, Shrimpolaris said:

You aren't familiar with entertainment for girls/women, are you? Not all of it men will like as they are being gazed hungrily at and imagined in various situations.

Well again, grew up in a mostly female led environment, had a lot of access to romance novels and movies aimed towards women so I'm at least somewhat familiar.

It's not like my mom and my aunties looked at the big sexy man on screen and told me I should be more like him though that's probably my own luxury.

And hey, maybe they're just weren't as crazy as what you're thinking about.

Now, were you a gay man, it may be different. I personally don't know any gay men, at least not that I know of, so it's not a subject I fully understand, but I can definitely imagine how uncomfortable you might be if a gender you aren't sexually attracted to starts treating you as an object of desire.

If that be the case, then I agree with you.

35 minutes ago, Shrimpolaris said:

You can't stop the horny (for both males and females), but you can educate people to live and deal with it.

And educate those whose minds still live in the past how to treat others better.

Going "Sex object bad" ain't improving anyones lives. And blaming it all on the past ain't the solution, either.

Maybe I don't fully understand your point here but I'd rather not tell people that for their gender they'll be treated like shit and should never stand up for it.

The first step to solving any problem is to bring it into conversation, why would I not talk about how portraying people as nothing but sex objects is bad? If we truly want to educate those whose minds still in the past, wouldn't that be the first step?

I don't blame the past, nor do I seek there for answers for the future, I simply believe that by observing the past we can gain an understanding for why things are the way they are.

The solution I think is simple.

Treat your characters as through they were your family. Give them personality, backstory, nuance, and if you must, an honorable death.

54 minutes ago, Shrimpolaris said:

I kinda agree with you.

However a character can be compelling and sexy at the same time. One does not nullify the other, and disregarding characters because of how they look is what i have a problem with.

And honestly, nothing wrong with liking a character for shallow reason (cool, pretty, badass, sexy, whatever), either.

I guess I didn't make it clear enough but yes, I 100% agree with you.

I encourage artists to feel free to make sexy characters, there's nothing inherently wrong with that. It's a character being built around fanservice that bothers me.

 

 

[Shrimpica]

28 minutes ago, GuardianSing said:

maybe they're just weren't as crazy as what you're thinking about.

I know some women that are really really thirsty. Although tbf mostly in animanga circles where such a thing ain't frowned upon as much as in "normal" circles.

28 minutes ago, GuardianSing said:

f there's also a lot of male sexual exploitation then please let me know.

Did you hear about the church pedo scandal? Dunno how prelevant it is in America, but alot of the victims were boys.

Also more often than not male rape victims get overlooked (underage or not) and get told how they should've enjoyed it like a real man would.

I was just reading about one such case the other day.

28 minutes ago, GuardianSing said:

Maybe I don't fully understand your point here but I'd rather not tell people that for their gender they'll be treated like shit and should never stand up for it.

Umm no. That's not what i said, at all. I said that removing sexualization won't solve the problem.

Speaking from experience and places i visited/lived in/traveled to, countries where sexualization is frowned upon, treat their women much much much worse (typically conservative places), and heck, women are even more objectified there despite the lack of sexualization.

Less sexualization won't lead to less objectifation, it might lead to more. Teaching people to treat each other as human is much much more important.

28 minutes ago, GuardianSing said:

The first step to solving any problem is to bring it into conversation, why would I not talk about how portraying people as nothing but sex objects is bad? If we truly want to educate those whose minds still in the past, wouldn't that be the first step?

People should learn that, and they should also learn to differentiate between fiction and reality. I don't think sexualization in itself is a bad thing (even if it annoys me if i am gonna be honest) aslong as people treat fiction as fiction and reality as reality and vice versa.

Fiction is it's own thing, and so is reality. Even if fiction is influenced by reality, those in reality influenced by fiction to the point they act on it need to get checked in the head.

28 minutes ago, GuardianSing said:

Treat your characters as through they were your family. Give them personality, backstory, nuance, and if you must, an honorable death.

Serious stories - yes, definitely.

Parodies, entertainment or even fetishes - idc, to each and their own, i won't judge.

Edited April 29, 2022 by Shrimpolaris

[null]

 

[GuardianSing]

5 minutes ago, Shrimpolaris said:

Did you hear about the church pedo scandal? Dunno how prelevant it is in America, but alot of the victims were boys.

Also more often than not male rape victims get overlooked (underage or not) and get told how they should've enjoyed it like a real man would.

I was just reading about one such case the other day.

Hmm, yeah, I didn't think of that being related to gender as much. Thank you for bringing this to light.

7 minutes ago, Shrimpolaris said:

Umm no. That's not what i said, at all. I said that removing sexualization won't solve the problem.

Speaking from experience and places i visited/lived in/traveled to, countries where sexualization is frowned upon, treat their women much much much worse (typically conservative places), and heck, women are even more objectified there despite the lack of sexualization.

I actually wanted to bring this up in the previous post but didn't know how to.

Aye, it's true, and I wanted to bring up how I believe that more nonchalantly sexy characters would help more than anything. All across the world sex and sexuality has ( and still is) been viewed as some kind of sin while simultaneously being used as a marketing tool to sell people stuff, and it works because of how often folks are starved of something that should be treated as a normal part of being human.

Now I think I've seen this first hand. Both me and my brother were taught about that stuff pretty early on in our lives, but not with a sense of taboo around the subject, no it was all about freedom and having a positive look on the human body, which is why it was a big shock to both of us just how...exoticized it all was in pop culture, and not in a good way.

And since then I've learned just how restrictive other's sexual education can be, if they get any at all, and how it often makes them feel ashamed of their bodies.

I think that's why sex sells, it's seen as such a big taboo which is why it's so attractive to people even if they'd be too ashamed to admit it.

I feel we might land at a better place if we seek to normalize the human body instead of demonize it as this sinful lustful thing.

Unrelated but I have a few funny stories about folks visiting and being shocked at how freely my family sometimes talks about sex and sexuality.

24 minutes ago, Shrimpolaris said:

Less sexualization won't lead to less objectifation, it might lead to more. Teaching people to treat each other as human is much much more important.

People should learn that, and they should also learn to differentiate between fiction and reality. I don't think sexualization in itself is a bad thing (even if it annoys me if i am gonna be honest) aslong as people treat fiction as fiction and reality as reality and vice versa.

Fiction is it's own thing, and so is reality. Even if fiction is influenced by reality, those in reality influenced by fiction to the point they act on it need to get checked in the head.

Reminds me of stories I used to hear of European men thinking American women are easy to chat up because American movies made them look so.

Don't know if that's a point or not but I was reminded of it.

32 minutes ago, Shrimpolaris said:

Serious stories - yes, definitely.

Parodies, entertainment or even fetishes - idc, to each and their own, i won't judge.

Fair enough. I mean when it comes to an extremely simple franchise like Mario I don't rally arms screaming of justice for Princess Peach because at this point I'm convinced they do it because of tradition rather than old ideas.

Though I'll still occasionally bring up the fact that Princess Peach has been in more playable appearances in the Mario series than Zelda has in the Legend of Zelda series

[Shrimpica]

27 minutes ago, GuardianSing said:

which is why it was a big shock to both of us just how...exoticized it all was in pop culture, and not in a good way.

Oh definitely. It's overglorified, to the point of trashiness alot of times.

27 minutes ago, GuardianSing said:

I think that's why sex sells, it's seen as such a big taboo which is why it's so attractive to people even if they'd be too ashamed to admit it.

It honestly sickening, this hypocrisy.

An open secret everyone is ashamed to admit and no one wants to bring to light or educate people.

Especially prelevant again in conservative societies. But even less conservative ones ain't free from that hypocrisy, either.

27 minutes ago, GuardianSing said:

Reminds me of stories I used to hear of European men thinking American women are easy to chat up because American movies made them look so.

Heh.

Tbf the American people (not just women) i met were easier to talk to in general.

Then again, i never visited murica. I did however visit London and i was surprised how strangers just talked with each other on the street there. Even i got chatted up a couple times. In Germany i would never do that lol.

27 minutes ago, GuardianSing said:

Though I'll still occasionally bring up the fact that Princess Peach has been in more playable appearances in the Mario series than Zelda has in the Legend of Zelda series

BOTW2 will give us playable Zelda, right?

...right?

Edited April 29, 2022 by Shrimpolaris

[GuardianSing]

25 minutes ago, Shrimpolaris said:

It honestly sickening, this hypocrisy.

An open secret everyone is ashamed to admit and no one wants to bring to light or educate people.

Especially prelevant again in conservative societies. But even less conservative ones ain't free from that hypocrisy, either.

A great deal of social pressure is to blame I think. It's why in a lot of conservative Islamic communities women are often shamed for their bodies and forced to cover it up.

In the US it's not nearly as extreme but it's still somewhat prevalent with most women growing up with the idea that they must always be pretty and always dress properly. The marketing companies in the US bank on this by making advertisements that pressure women into buying their products.

A similar thing happens to men but not even close to the same degree, at least here.

And the exoticism of sexy women that's often shown in popular movies done to attract a male gaze only makes these insecurities worse, and I imagine it's the same the other way around.

But it's not often talked about because sex is a "sin" and exploring your body and treating it with respect will "send you to hell"

Things are definitely changing for the better, but only in certain areas. More conservative areas as we talked about are, to put it frankly, in some deep shit.

45 minutes ago, Shrimpolaris said:

BOTW2 will give us playable Zelda, right?

...right?

It is just amazing how hellbent Nintendo sometimes seems to be when making sure Zelda is a damsel in distress in every single bloody Zelda game.

Though I guess I can't complain too much. She is usually the most interesting part of the game and she does help a great deal in the final battle.

...Almost makes you wonder how she got kidnapped in the first place but whatever. I'm still holding out hope for BOTW2

[Jotari]

9 hours ago, Shrimpolaris said:

I generally agree with you here, however, it shouldn't detract from the character so much as to make one think they are completely shit.

Also when it comes to Pyra there's actually a reason. I am not a fan of her outfit, but when it comes to Pyra, there's a simple reason

I dunno how far you played so spoiler tag

  Hide contents

Pyra is suppossed to be everything Mythra is not. 

It makes alot of sense.

 

And on the whole thing:

• Reducing sexualization won't us make confront the sexist past. Treating women better and giving them rights irl does.
• It comes across as very hypocritical to those on the line or hard to convince people when you keep talking about sexualization of women as an issue while sexualization of males is there (and increasing). Yeah whataboutism is bs, but we are just giving them reasons on a golden platter.
• The whole "Character has to wear x" doesn't sound far of the religious dogma of people having to wear y. Like people always wanted to wear whatever they wanted, and now we are forcing them again because "sexualization"?
• We don't wanna reach the point where we have to wear something as to not offend others or something again.

Spoiler

Pyra and Mythra look that way because Klaus is a horny bastard.

Everyone here is talking more about this topic than the dedicated thread I made for it T.T 

Edited April 29, 2022 by Jotari

[Punished Dayni]

>More of the sexualisation talk

  I still don't have any interesting points to contribute on the sexualisation of fictional characters, sorry.

Although:

2 hours ago, GuardianSing said:

Aye, it's true, and I wanted to bring up how I believe that more nonchalantly sexy characters would help more than anything. All across the world sex and sexuality has ( and still is) been viewed as some kind of sin while simultaneously being used as a marketing tool to sell people stuff, and it works because of how often folks are starved of something that should be treated as a normal part of being human.

Okay, I am highly curious about what you're going on about for how characters would be written as nonchalantly sexy.

Are we talking like we get environments where women are wearing no tops as a normal thing? Are we talking about actually just not really acknowledging the skintight spandex on everyone in a show where the cast are expected to wear it for.... reasons? Or am I just thinking too simply here?

2 hours ago, GuardianSing said:

Now I think I've seen this first hand. Both me and my brother were taught about that stuff pretty early on in our lives, but not with a sense of taboo around the subject, no it was all about freedom and having a positive look on the human body, which is why it was a big shock to both of us just how...exoticized it all was in pop culture, and not in a good way.

Yeah, I definitely had a limited teaching perspective, we got a book on the subject at home (like I'd be talking about it more directly with my parents) and the school still had nuns at the time that topic would have come up so that was a bust (alongside the subject it was in being treated as a doss (and the usual attention seekers acting up during that discussion), though I suspect the curriculum wasn't that great either).

In a way, sexuality may be a part of human experience (Ignoring the ace end of the spectrum for this), but due to how societal barriers have been developed I'm not surprised at all that so many feel like it's this other thing, which helps allow for this exoticism, this use of it to draw people in, the othering of sex and how it can somehow be used as reward and punishment in these differing circumstances.

8 hours ago, Acacia Sgt said:

So is FEH the Weenie Hut Jr.?

Nah, the higher difficulties be like "Sink or swim" even without mentioning the high ranked PVP and the skill creep.

  You sure as shit don't see the Askrtrio being used for arena clears any more.

7 hours ago, Acacia Sgt said:

Weeee

EdelGodzilla would probably 1-round Rhea.

7 hours ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Then there was learning that the Western Church's response to a heresy during the Early Middle/Dark Ages denied lay Catholics communion wine until the 1960s, a full millennia without any drinkable Christ blood.

Seriously, until Vatican II?

7 hours ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

I saw someone post this today, in response to the idea that people should now abandon Twitter for Mastodon.

This isn't surprising. Mastodon seemingly having their chat groups separated this finely could help people with the sheer timeline bloat I'd expect from Twitter and not start getting this stuff they wouldn't want by shutting off items from those chats entirely.

The real shame is how few food chats there are.

Edited April 29, 2022 by Dayni

[BrightBow]

God, why does it 40 bucks to Sin & Punishment on the Switch for 12 months? It did cost only 12 bucks on the old Wii store and it was available permanently.

Also, maybe we could just make both Successor of the Earth and Successor of the Sky available at one console? That would be really nice.

Edited April 29, 2022 by BrightBow

[The Roger The Paladin]

There's some irony after all the trouble I had getting to Chapter 8x how smoothly the infamous Gomez went. Asbel oneshots him with Grafcalibur crit before he can even do anything.
The end. Kind of an anti-climax after my luck with capturing Rumei.

6 minutes ago, BrightBow said:

God, why does Sin & Punishment on the Switch cost 40 bucks? It did cost only 12 bucks on the old Wii store and it was available permanently.

Also, maybe we could just make both Successor of the Earth and Successor of the Sky available at one console? That would be really nice.

Is it actually available as a download game as opposed to just being part of switch online? I was planning to buy the Wii U eshop version before it went down.

[BrightBow]

4 minutes ago, The Roger The Paladin said:

Is it actually available as a download game as opposed to just being part of switch online? I was planning to buy the Wii U eshop version before it went down.

Just Switch Online.

Wasn't actually aware the Wii U had Successor of the Earth too. Shit!

Edited April 29, 2022 by BrightBow

[The Roger The Paladin]

Just now, BrightBow said:

Just Switch Online.

Wasn't actually aware the Wii U had Successor of the Earth too. Shit!

I'm just trying to find a hard drive that actually suits the Wii U's requirements (i.e, external power source, 2TB or less), before I go and pay out for eveything I still want on it. Or might want as a back up. Or intend to try (which basically amounts to Sin & Punishment and the Bonk games). Not easy because most external hard drives I've found available at stores do not match one criteria or the other. They're either too large (datawise), or have no external powersource.

[Punished Dayni]

21 minutes ago, The Roger The Paladin said:

There's some irony after all the trouble I had getting to Chapter 8x how smoothly the infamous Gomez went. Asbel oneshots him with Grafcalibur crit before he can even do anything.

Nice.

As to the WiiU VC, you know what, it would be nice to have that as an option. I'm not as bothered personally, I'm someone who's just using NSO trials at the moment and doesn't have enough interest in the expansion pack at the moment. But for someone who'd like to, say, play OoT sporadically and come back to it whenever, especially a decade later, it would be nice (well, so long as the emulation's fine, considering how that started.).

[Saint Rubenio]

10 hours ago, Sooks said:

So this is what you guys were preparing me for… It doesn’t seem all that bad, honestly. Unless he attacks Mist or something—

…an RNG proc skill? And renewal? Seriously?

Well, it’s okay, I have the greatest RNG skill of all: save states!

If you win, you get a character. If you leave, you get another character. If Ike dies, you have to reset the entire chapter, but you have save states, as you said.

9 hours ago, Sooks said:

This part is actually poorly designed though.

The entire game, you mean?

9 hours ago, Newtype06 said:

kek

Still better than trying to play sharpshooter with the world's most inaccurate gun.

Fuck gender norms, I'll sit to pee if I bloody well please.

9 hours ago, Shrimpolaris said:

You only only repeat a few steps instead of all?

What i am saying in case of Conquest is that i do different steps, not just the same ones again

8 hours ago, Shrimpolaris said:

yeah with most official FE, and especially Conquest i don't use save states

It's funny you say that, because for me personally, it's the complete opposite: The FE where I feel this "resetting only means redoing everything the exact same way" thing is precisely Conquest. Conquest strategies are so tight that any time I reset, I end up just doing the exact same thing again to get back to where I was. Because if it works, it works, there's zero reason to change it until I get to the part where I screwed up.

It greatly contributed to my burn out. Mistakes are very easy to make in Conquest, and you cannot afford to make a single one - or worse, get bad RNG. And since using save states felt cheap to me, outside of bullshit moments like Kotaro and Kitsune Hell (where it felt justified), I forced myself to just do everything over and over, every single time I made a whoopsie... Which eventually led to me not wanting to have anything to do with the game for the foreseeable future. Because it was extremely tiresome to play but I was too prideful to simply save state every turn.

Oof.

8 hours ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Speaking of degeneration.:

I saw someone post this today, in response to the idea that people should now abandon Twitter for Mastodon.

Because Elon Musk bought it, right?

I mean, it doesn't matter to me either way. I'm not big on social media. Hell, this thread is the most social media I use.

Anyway, yes. Let's all move to this place. If only because at least this one looks like it doesn't shove "PLEASE MAKE ACCOUNT" pop-ups on you every five seconds if you aren't logged in. Which I'm not. Because I haven't touched my Twitter account in like, 6 years. Heck, I don't even remember why I made it anymore. I think some kind of contest a Youtuber I watched was holding? But then I didn't even enter that because it was too complicated.

8 hours ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Something more astringent would probably kick me off my feet and break my happy ass.

Yeaaah I don't think I'd recommend Omori to you. Omori can get very hard to watch.

8 hours ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Now I have a certain other game on my mind.

Uhhhhh do tell.

[BrightBow]

Some time ago Twitter also started blocking any kind of scrolling on a timeline without being logged in. Accessing the Media tag was disabled for even longer.
Getting strongarmed like that just makes me want to not make an account out of pure spite if nothing else.

[Saint Rubenio]

lol I just saw one of my videos (the Haitaka one, to be specific) being shared in one of the Discord servers where I lurk for not much of a reason.

That's a weird feeling. But it feels nice. People that don't even know me are watching my shit! Only a bit longer till I beat Pewdiepie. Then I can make all of mankind play Berwick Saga.

2 minutes ago, BrightBow said:

Some time ago Twitter also started blocking any kind of scrolling on a timeline without being logged in. Accessing the Media tag was disabled for even longer.
Getting strongarmed like that just makes me want to not make an account out of pure spite if nothing else.

Yeah, Twitter has been really obsessed with getting people to make accounts for a while now. It ended up spawning different sites that display Twitter without all of its inconveniences. Which is just sad.

[Lightcosmo]

4 hours ago, GuardianSing said:

Though I'll still occasionally bring up the fact that Princess Peach has been in more playable appearances in the Mario series than Zelda has in the Legend of Zelda series

Is this inheretly a bad thing? I mean, the writer should have the freedom to write their story the way they want, not be forced otherwise cause someone doesn't like it, that's how writing goes, not everyone will like their work.

[Lightcosmo]

And that's not saying these things are neccessarily okay, i mean, I think the fact that Tine get's abused by her family and Ishtar standing by and doing nothing is interesting from a narrative PoV, it is intended to set a mood and give the reader an emotional image, and i think it does it's job, that's not saying "it's okay to abuse people".

The writer just wanted to create an interesting backstory for the character, which i'm fairly sure is successfull?

[Interdimensional Observer]

3 hours ago, Jotari said:

Everyone here is talking more about this topic than the dedicated thread I made for it T.T 

That is part of human nature don't you know? During the later Middle Ages, university students would sometimes take their final exams -verbal arguments due to the scarcity of paper- in public. Students and faculty members present were allowed to attend and ask any question they wanted of the exam-taking student. Some of those questions might've been good questions, but since the universities didn't screen and select the public's questions in advance, problematic inquiries happened frequently enough. Controversial topics- like religion, and contemporary politics; also provocative and vengeful unserious questions probably along the modern lines of "Want to know how Your Mom groaned last night?".

Humans will always have an inclination to talk about things where they shouldn't be.

 

2 hours ago, Dayni said:

Seriously, until Vatican II?

According to the book, yes.

The heresy -the book doesn't formally name it- asserted that both bread and wine were absolutely necessary for Communion. The Western Church (this was the Dark Ages the book was describing, before the Great Schism of 1054) disagreed with this, in part due to the IRL logistical problems of getting wine to parts of Christendom where grapes didn't grow well. Bread you can make with many grains suited for many different climates, grape vines are much more finicky/ Scandinavia and the British Isles would probably have had to import all/90% of their Jesus blood, not easy in the premodern world.

The Church asserted theologically that the flesh and blood of Christ were one and inseparable. To partake of the bread that was His flesh, meant to also ingest the blood; to ingest the wine that was His blood, was to partake of the flesh as well. Thus one could fully participate in Communion with either bread or wine. In practice, the Church wanted everyone to understand this point, and so asserted it by taking the wine away from the laity. For nearly 1000 years, only the Catholic priest who administered the Eucharist could drink the consecrated wine. For a while at least, clergy did continue to hand out wine to laymen and laywomen out of tradition, but this was ordinary, unconsecrated wine, it contributed nothing towards your participation in the Eucharist.

Presumably, the Protestant Reformation freed the sacred wine from the priest and returned it to the masses in parts of Europe. However, as I had coincidentally learned beforehand in a book on the Thirty Years' War, this change slowly began before the Reformation. As in Bohemia -modern Czech Republic- a moderate form of Hussitism arose, Jan Hus a late 14th century reformist theologian whose followers after his death managed to form a little subdivision in Catholicism which the Church tolerated until the start of the 30YW. The moderate Hussitism group was known as Utraquism, and as part of a compromise with the Catholic Church, had its priests ordained not in Rome, but Venice. Utraquism got its name from a Latin phrase meaning "in both kinds", because Utraquism asserted the laity should be allowed both bread and wine at the Eucharist. The 30YW described it as a movement with an egalitarian, charitable drive, although it was in the process of naturally dying out by the early 1600s.

-Getting back to Catholicism, that only the holy man who led the Eucharist could drink the wine, was part of the reason why the proliferation of vineyards across Europe in the Dark and Medieval Ages cannot be explained solely in terms of religious necessity. And even when the masses had been allowed to drink blessed Communion wine, it likely amounted to next to nothing of the total wine supply. As the wine history book asserts the Church suggested 3 Communions a year at the minimum, an extraordinarily low number which many people nonetheless failed to meet. In conclusion- the explosion of grapevines across Europe was cultural. A culture endorsed by the Church, and secular: drinkers*, producers, and wine sellers, alike. "Religious ritual necessity" is no argument to explain the rise of wine as a signature European product enjoyed from west to east and north to south at all.

 

*By "drinkers", it was mostly the royal/aristocratic elite and mercantile middle class. The poor drank nothing (I'm excluding beer here), only on special occasions, or poor quality stuff like piquette. Piquette being taking the skins, stems and residues of grapes left over after pressing all the fresh unfermented juice -must- out of the grapes (via treading with human feet and then putting the grapes through a wine press), and soaking those well-used grape remains in water. Stuff like piquette had been drunk by the poor in classical Greece and the Roman Empire as well. It's technically "wine", but the alcohol content is very low (good, the ruling elite don't like drunken mobs of the unwashed masses; nonetheless, the alcohol can still kill some waterborne bacteria), and the watery flavor is very bitter. Classism, a tale of two bottles. (The elite Greco-Roman ideal wine being a very strong & sweet white, which they then diluted with fresh or sea water, and threw stuff like spices, herbs, honey, resin, pitch and lead into. In the Medieval period, the Mediterranean continued to provide wines sweeter than the norm up in more northern Europe.)

 

1 hour ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Uhhhhh do tell.

Ehhh, this is like chili peppers. What sends columns of fire out of both ends of one person, might be a quarter-second sniffle to another. You can take the heat and snack on habaneros, I by contrast would be melting. Said game certainly wouldn't do it for you.

Edited April 29, 2022 by Interdimensional Observer

[Armagon]

I know for a fact that most people voted bittersweet because of the ESRB description. Takahashi likes his happy endings, even the most fucked up entries in the series have happy endings, so there's a 99% certainty Xenoblade 3 will end happily.

The only Xeno game to go against this is Torna and that's only because prequel status said it couldn't be happy.

9 hours ago, Shrimpolaris said:

eh

I wouldn't call either of Echoes or 3H exactly good for ironmans

Tbf those have the Turnwheel, which the point is "you can reload just the turn".

....wait that is the do-over option i was talking about huh.

8 hours ago, GuardianSing said:

If a male character is sexualized that's not too bad since it's most likely a character made by men, you can be sure that it will end being a real character.

I really do not like this line, i know you've made other points but i extremely disagree with this. A real character can be made by anyone, no matter what they look like.

I will use Dahlia as an example

Now i actually really hate this design just in general but this character design was actually come up with by a woman. A woman drew this. And despite the uh, bad design, the character itself is actually pretty sweet.

I'm using this as an example because female sexualized characters can be created by women (you'd be surprised at how many tbh) and can still be proper characters in their own right.

• On the subject because it's linked, the whole "they were a porn artist lol" argument that a lot of people like to use as a "gotcha" (not saying you say this fyi) does not really work. As if porn somehow makes you a lesser artist. Name a popular Japanese artist, they probably drew porn at some point. Hell, Gustave Courbet drew Origin of the World (i am not responsible if you look this up) and he's regarded as one of the best French painters in history and was one of the founders of the Realism movement (if i remember this bit correctly). 

6 hours ago, GuardianSing said:

Treat your characters as through they were your family. Give them personality, backstory, nuance, and if you must, an honorable death.

If it were that simple, i wouldn't be seeing dumb Xenoblade 2 discourse on Twitter from people who haven't actually played the game, trending for the fifth time in a single week about five years after the game released.

5 hours ago, Shrimpolaris said:

Also more often than not male rape victims get overlooked (underage or not) and get told how they should've enjoyed it like a real man would.

I was just reading about one such case the other day.

Male abuse gets overlooked in general because "no way a man can be a victim of this". There's literally a big court case going on about it right now, Johnny Depp was abused by his ex-wife but she pretended to be the victim and the entire world believed her. Only now are the facts coming to light (i mean the facts have been out for like a few years now but only now is it being shown in court).

4 hours ago, Shrimpolaris said:

BOTW2 will give us playable Zelda, right?

...right?

We'll find out at the end of the year lol.

4 hours ago, GuardianSing said:

...Almost makes you wonder how she got kidnapped in the first place but whatever. I'm still holding out hope for BOTW2

How many times has Zelda actually gotten kidnapped?

• She got kidnapped in Zelda 1 cause of course
• She gets kidnapped in a Link to the Past
• She gets kidnapped towards the end of Ocarina of Time
• I think the same goes for Wind Waker
• She gets kidnapped in A Link Between Worlds
• I think Skyward Sword

So like six games out of how many there are. Now obviously Zelda has been put in other unfavorable situations (on her own accord or otherwise) but if we specifically look at kidnappings, it's just six.

1 hour ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Because Elon Musk bought it, right?

Actually he might not in the end anyways, cause his Tesla stock dropped lmao.

Also if he buys Twitter and let's it become the "champion of free speech", then China, who owns a good chunk of Tesla stock, might have a few....things to do about that Tesla stock.

[Eltosian Kadath]

59 minutes ago, The Roger The Paladin said:

There's some irony after all the trouble I had getting to Chapter 8x how smoothly the infamous Gomez went. Asbel oneshots him with Grafcalibur crit before he can even do anything.

Gomez is only notorious for how difficult he is to deal with when you have no access to magic (for instance if Asbel is fatigued, or not recruited, or dead)...

 

Well I avoided jumping into this debate so far,  but to steal a joke, I guess I failed my wisdom save.

12 hours ago, Shrimpolaris said:

• It comes across as very hypocritical to those on the line or hard to convince people when you keep talking about sexualization of women as an issue while sexualization of males is there (and increasing). Yeah whataboutism is bs, but we are just giving them reasons on a golden platter.

You are sorta missing what I see as the main problem with the sexualization of female characters, not that it exists, but that it has infested the mainstream to the point that it is almost impossible to avoid. To find those instances of the sexualization of males,

7 hours ago, Shrimpolaris said:

 

You aren't familiar with entertainment for girls/women, are you? Not all of it men will like as they are being gazed hungrily at and imagined in various situations.

you had to go looking in genres where that trope are known and well used, with instances in the main stream being uncommon. If female sexualization where treated the same way, where you mostly just find it in genres where sexualization is the appeal, it wouldn't be a problem.

 

12 hours ago, Shrimpolaris said:

• The whole "Character has to wear x" doesn't sound far of the religious dogma of people having to wear y. Like people always wanted to wear whatever they wanted, and now we are forcing them again because "sexualization"?

And the current norm of "Character has to wear sexualized clothing" isn't a problem now?

Perhaps I am projecting a bit of @Ottservia's ranting on the matter, but there seems to be this knee-jerk reaction defenders of this have, like reducing the amount of female sexualization means the complete elimination of it. It always comes across as either naively apocalyptic, or disingenuous argumentation.

 

6 hours ago, Shrimpolaris said:

 

Also more often than not male rape victims get overlooked (underage or not) and get told how they should've enjoyed it like a real man would.

That has its own history within media, as it was a common trope in Sit-Coms and mainstream Rom-Coms back in the day to have an undesirable (read fat, creepy, or trans) women rape a man, and that to be the literal butt of the joke. The trope has fallen out of favor, which is an improvement, as the very clear message sent was that men being raped is a joke, although I remember still seeing some of those back in the late 90s (probably even into the early 2000s...) when I was a kid...

 

3 hours ago, Jotari said:

Everyone here is talking more about this topic than the dedicated thread I made for it T.T 

I mean your thread missed one of the best commentaries on the subject back in the unpopular opinion thread

On 12/23/2021 at 12:37 AM, lenticular said:

So, hi. Queer woman here. Speaking only for myself, of course, because queer women are not a monolithic group and we have many varying and different opinions. For myself, though, when I see female characters -- be they in video games or other media -- I typically relate to them in two different ways.The first is external: is she an interesting character who drives the narative? Is she someone I would get along with if I met in real life? Do I find her physically attractive and enjoy looking at her? The second way is empathetic: can I imagine myself in her shoes? Is she having experiences similar to what I have had? Do I want to be her?

In cases of blatantly sexual objectification, the latter almost invariably wins out. I don't feel horny because, hey, hot woman, I feel creeped out because I see objectification and find it gross and creepy. And then I feel even further creeped out when I realise that it is something that is ostensibly being done for my benefit, as the player/viewer. The game (or whatever) is making me complicit in the objectification, and I am not OK with that.

This is especially the case when it comes to skeevy camera direction that unduly focuses on butt and boobs. If a woman is being presented as being comfortable with her sexuality then I can get behind that. At least in theory. Sometimes not, because it's handled attrociously, but if it's done well then I'm all for it. But when it's all about the camera lingering on boobs and butt, then that isn't something that the character is doing; that's something that is being done to the character. The focus is not on the character but on the person watching.

Even for characters I otherwise like (eg, Manuela from Three Houses or Miranda Lawson from Mass Effect 2) that sort of treatment will sour me on the character. I can't think about either of those two characters without feeling just a little bit skeevy and gross. For characters that I am otherwise indifferent to (eg, Camilla from Fates), it means that the creepy objectification is the dominant memory and emtion I have when I think of them.

 

 

1 hour ago, Saint Rubenio said:

 

Anyway, yes. Let's all move to this place. If only because at least this one looks like it doesn't shove "PLEASE MAKE ACCOUNT" pop-ups on you every five seconds if you aren't logged in. Which I'm not. Because I haven't touched my Twitter account in like, 6 years. Heck, I don't even remember why I made it anymore. I think some kind of contest a Youtuber I watched was holding? But then I didn't even enter that because it was too complicated.

1 hour ago, BrightBow said:

Some time ago Twitter also started blocking any kind of scrolling on a timeline without being logged in. Accessing the Media tag was disabled for even longer.
Getting strongarmed like that just makes me want to not make an account out of pure spite if nothing else.

I have never made an account on that hell site, and don't really see these at the times when I do bother going there, probably due to how aggressively I ad block, and police my cookies.

 

[Interdimensional Observer]

3 hours ago, Dayni said:

>More of the sexualisation talk

  I still don't have any interesting points to contribute on the sexualisation of fictional characters, sorry.

Pretty much same as me. All I want to say right now is I want genderbent Xiaomu. Gimme XiaoDude! Well drawn ofc.🤗