@fitscotgaymer I don't want to be impolite, only to say that he's got a bit of a checkered history when it comes to this subject. That's why I'm giving the warning. It's fine so far, I just want it to stay that way.
Like I said, I don't think he is or was being ignorant or bigoted. I just think he had his viewpoint, wasn't considering other view points, wasn't explaining his view point very well, and was/is being rather obtuse about the whole thing.
I can't be too hard on him about that because, hey its human nature isn't it?
I mean you see things how you see them. And sometimes its hard to get that across to people who dont see things the same way.
I don't know how many times i've had folk harangue me on the BSN for something ive posted. And I am like "what? why?" and it wasn't until several heated posts back and forth that we were able to establish what had gone wrong, and where I had failed to communicate myself correctly and come off a bit of a pillock.
@fitscotgaymer Yeah, it happens. I am just trying to prevent this thread from being closed due to flaming. This is only the latest thread on the subject, and the only one open at the moment. Posting anything about alternate sexualities in Baldur's Gate is like tossing flame bait for trolls. "Post it, and they WILL come." I've seen somewhere between seven and ten threads closed just since I joined the boards. The only other one I see being open is the Female-Female Romance thread, probably because it turned into "Post a character that a mod could use to create a romanceable character" thread towards the end.
(Though I have no actual idea who this Ed Greenwood is, other than he is the "God" and "Creator" of the Realms. Sounds like I need to do some research!)
Although it is not my place to do as such, I feel the relevant need to say sorry on the behalf of anyone who has flamed this post, purely because the mentioning of sexuality was brought up. I'll not speak further on that matter, though. I do hope this thread stays up; If it doesn't @LadyRhian ; Would you mind if I copied the entire text and saved it? I'd like to read it every now and again, it's a marvelous read!
I think you @LadyRhian and @Ward are both annoyed/irritated by the same thing here.
The thead after thread about sexuality attracting trolls, causing arguements, and fighting. Whereas you @LadyRhian realise why it happens, you wish it didn't; @Ward just doesn't get why it happens at all, and wishes the whole subject (which he sees as pointless) would go away.
Society ought not ostracize anybody, however, society ought not do what they're doing now which is utterly bombarding people with their own particular moral high grounds relating to accepting of gays, ethnicity, women, religion.
Ok, one's morals allow him to be pedophile.
Should society (including you) ostracize him on that ground in your view? Should we maybe make a themed romance in an RPG?
Morality is something that is personal to a person, and changes from person to person depending on their point of view and experiences.
Thus, someone might think it immoral to sleep with someone outside of wedlock. And someone might not. That doesn't mean either party is wrong. But neither party has the right to step on the rights of the other based on that moral outlook.
Acting on pedophilia is a highly illegal not to mention physically and psychologically damaging act to a child, and often more than one child.
Most "moral objections" come from personal opinion on something that frankly doesnt affect the person doing the objecting. Pedophilia is illegal precisely because it IS indeed damaging, and does indeed affect other people. It is akin to rape, not homosexuality.
Laws are made for a very good reason, not just because society at large "doesn't like" something.
Neither @Ward nor myself, nor anyone else suggested that "society" didn't have the right to censure people for ILLEGAL, damaging, and abusive acts. And insinuating otherwise... I don't even have the words...
So, "illegal". Laws do differ greatly from country to country, as well as the morality does.
For example, earlier, in my country homosexualism used to be outlawed, plain and simple. In Saudi Arabia, AFAIK, it is normal to have a hand hacked off for thievery. In California, AFAIK, homosexual marriages are allowed officially. In Netherlands, the prostitution is a legal business.
What I mean to say with that, is that the statement "Society has to accept people of all morals" is senseless at best, and harmful for the societies at worst.
Not arguing with you. You know it is a vastly different thing. You know what the guy meant, and you know what I meant. You are deliberately being obtuse and "misunderstanding" to provoke an arguement.
Assuming the majority of people are heterosexual is different from assuming a person has some sort of fetish. Your comparison is flawed. Thus far, I haven't encountered that many gay couples when walking around in my city, nor in the places I visit. Is it so wrong of me to assume gay people are less apparent then?
@fitscotgaymer : I don't see how @Kitteh_On_A_Cloud's statement is in any way rude. I mean, through religion restrictions or not... Homosexuality *is* a minority. It's a statistical fact. I know one might take offense, but take for example my country : two million inhabitants - not many. We were in fact also atheist until 1991, simply because religion was a crime in a dictatorship. Statistics aren't always 100% correct, true, but statistics still say that in 2009, there were one thousand homosexuals in our country. That's 1/2000 in comparison.
I mean, don't take offense if Kitteh here just makes an assumption about a certain statistic - that's in no way offensive, in my personal opinion. I am heterosexual, true, but I don't see why all this fuss must be made simply because of sexuality. Good lord, we don't have the inquisition any more, people don't get hunted - or at least, not EVERYWHERE (sadly there are places, discrimination exists, but if we fight over such small facts, then how are we to fix that big big problem?)
Assumptions aren't made to be rude, they are made to discuss a certain subject -they can be true, or not. In this case, statistically, what Kitteh_On_A_Cloud said, is true. If we make an assumption that I'm a moron - it might be true, it might be not. I'm not taking offense, I'll just see what happens out of it. To my defense - I like cheese. But this is a bad example because that's not an assumption related to statistics. It's a different thing, so you can't compare the two - that's why fetishes can't be compared to statistics.
To move things back on-topic, I think it would be interesting to analyze how sexuality affects gender roles in the Realms. We all see the disclaimer at character creation that your sex doesn't have any effect on your advancement, but does that actually hold true in the "reality" of the setting? How do female characters in Realms literature compare to males, in terms of not only prominence in the setting, but also development and conformity to common stereotypes? We have already established that there is very little presence of homosexual gender roles in Realms cultures, but is that due to the fictional cultures themselves, or the simple bias of the authors?
I'm sure a lot of it depends on the society. I couldn't imagine say, Evereska, handling gender roles the same way as, say, Rashemen, for instance. As for homosexual gender roles, I want to say it's probably more of the latter, but we have no way of really proving this since as you said there isn't much to go on.
I would make an argument here for publisher bias and market share being possible reasons why there's very little presence of LGBT peoples in the Forgotten Realms world. There could be author bias too, but it doesn't seem to be coming from Ed Greenwood. These books are read by a lot of kids and GLBT kid's literature is a very edgy, touchy subject that makes h8ers go wild. I bet some FR authors would love to explore this subject but can't sell it to the managing editors. Sales would drop.
You clearly missed the qualifiers in my statement lol.
I said it would be rather rude IF he/she was making assumptions about people he/she doesn't know anything about, and frankly would be none of his/her business to make; and it would be obtuse if he/she was unwilling to consider why that would be rude.
I didn't say he/she was being rude.
Also rude and offensive are not the same thing.
Rudeness is largely related to manners and courtesy. Having consideration for the viewpoints of others, or lack thereof. Offensiveness is usually related to being outright nasty, horrible, or mean to people for reasons.
My advisory that you really shouldn't make assumptions about people at all when you know nothing about them has nothing to do with the fact that homosexuality is a minority. Trust me I know better than you that I am not part of the majority.
The best thing to do, if you are as an accepting and tolerant human being that you may like to think you are, would be to assume nothing about a person you don't know. Good or bad. As much as you can anyway.
My point I guess would be this.
Treat everyone the same, when you first meet them and when you don't know them.
EDIT: Perhaps I can clear up what I mean.
When you make an assumption about a person you don't know, you are setting up in your head what you think that person is like. And that speaks to how you treat them. And if you later find out that you were wrong in your assumption about them, then it will change how you treat them. Perhaps positively, perhaps negatively.
Either way it would be unfair on that person, because it would be a shift in how you treat them that was nothing to do with who they are, what they did, or how your relationship with that person is developing.
Example: You are Mister A. You Mister A are into Football/Soccer in a big way. You are also athletic. You meet Mister B. Mister B is also into Football/Soccer in a big way. He is also athletic. You met at a match. You think you might get on with Mister B. Seems like you have things in common. He seems nice. You assume that he is a red blooded heterosexual male. You decide to invite Mister B out for a friendly drink at your local bar. You have a great time with the guy. You find out some more things you have in common, and somethings that you don't but hey thats cool because he seems like a great guy. You could be great friends. You meet up a few more times to do things that would traditionally be associated as heterosexual male pasttimes. Because those are both your interests, and you both must be straight right? The, Mister B thinking your a cool dude and all round awesome guy, introduces you to his boyfriend. Suddenly Mister B isn't your buddy anymore. Suddenly he is a sneaky gay. You have nothing against gay people but you are annoyed he didn't tell you he was gay, or do or say something to make it obvious, cos you know he should have. You don't know any gay people. It confuses you that he is gay, because he seemed so much like you. So straight. So normal. How can he be gay? Is he sure? But you decide all of that is none of your business. Your an accepting and tolerant modern man. He's still your Gay Buddy. And you don't care. He will stay your Gay Buddy. But Mister B isn't stupid, he realises you thought he was straight and don't really know how to deal with him being Gay. He knows you like him as a friend, and gets that you want to stay friends; but he realises that he is suddenly your Gay Friend. And not just your friend anymore. And that sudden change. That feeling, and perception that you no longer view him as "normal". That will hurt. Because of your initial assumption that, hey he must be straight cos most people are, made you treat him one way. And finding out he isn't straight, will make you treat him different. You have a Gay Buddy now. But he just wants to be your buddy.
Do you see what I am getting at?
It doesn't matter if you mean for it to happen, how you treat that person will change if you make erroneous assumptions about them to start with that you later find out isn't true. And that will affect them.
Take the above example and take out the heterosexual assumption. Mister B would have become your buddy without qualification on his own merits, and not because of any assumptions you made about him. And he woulda stayed just your buddy after the "gay revelation" because of how you became friends in the first place.
What Only moments ago @Kitteh_On_A_Cloud was saying me and dis guy looked cute together on a thread ._. Haven't really read much, don't wanna reallllly get into an argument of the Sexs. .____.
I generally assume that everyone is bisexual because I consider sexuality to be a spectrum and everyone's on it except for my friend Rupert (whose name I have cleverly disguised with the name of a Nick Jr. cartoon character). So when I talk to people about their siggio's (that's shorthand for "significant others", made slightly less shorthand by my having to explain it) I tend to word it in terms of "Do you have a special person in your life", rather than "Do you have a boyfriend/girlfriend".
Recently there was an episode of How I Met Your Mother (by which I mean I recently saw an episode that had aired last season...I'm way behind, leave me alone) where two guys [briefly] considered adopting a child together despite being straight. And I actually thought, you know what? There's totally nothing wrong with that. Because sexuality is a spectrum, and two responsible adults should be able to make the decision to start a family together without wanting to make out or even kiss.
Of course, in How I Met Your Mother it didn't work out because one of the dudes was bat-nuts crazy and wanted to buy the kid a pet cobra, but in other circumstances and with a different pair of individuals I can see how it would work out great.
...Kinda got derailed there. I think my point was that I try not to assume that anyone is gay or straight, but rather that everyone is open to anything (in terms of their sexual alignment) as long as they're not predisposed against it--and really, without asking them, how can you be sure?
@fitscotgaymer I actually thought that bit about Mr A and Mr B was a superb example! It's so precise of how it actually works :0 Sorry if it sounds sad to praise you, but I'm going to have to use that from now on XD That's sucha easy way to explain it!
That's what I was going to bring up earlier in regards to another post. If you have to categorize someone as your "Fill in the blank here" friend, it smacks of ticking off a checklist. I have friends who happen to be gay, black, whathaveyou, but I don't refer to them as my "Fill in the blank" friend. They are my friends, period. And if you ask, well, yes, they happen to be black, gay, transgendered, etc. If you have to say, "I have a Gay friend!" I wonder what you see more, that they are your friend, or the tag that comes before that point.
@fitscotgaymer: Funny to see how you're talking about me making assumptions being 'bad' while making the assumption yourself that I'd treat a person differently when discovering they're gay. Also, as @Cheesebelly hinted at, I think it's perfectly normal to assume most people are straight. So I don't care what you think of it, but please stop offending me and let's just agree to disagree. When I discover someone's gay, what do you think will change? That I drop that particular friend? I'd rather say it pokes my curiosity. But thanks for assuming I'd treat them differently. Man, am I glad I'm not as obsessed with genders all around. A person is a person, and that's the end of it.
Comments
I have seen those posts lol.
Like I said, I don't think he is or was being ignorant or bigoted. I just think he had his viewpoint, wasn't considering other view points, wasn't explaining his view point very well, and was/is being rather obtuse about the whole thing.
I can't be too hard on him about that because, hey its human nature isn't it?
I mean you see things how you see them. And sometimes its hard to get that across to people who dont see things the same way.
I don't know how many times i've had folk harangue me on the BSN for something ive posted. And I am like "what? why?" and it wasn't until several heated posts back and forth that we were able to establish what had gone wrong, and where I had failed to communicate myself correctly and come off a bit of a pillock.
(Plays necromancer on the thread...)
http://forum.baldursgate.com/discussion/4334/female-female-romance/p1
@LadyRhian Good job!
(Though I have no actual idea who this Ed Greenwood is, other than he is the "God" and "Creator" of the Realms. Sounds like I need to do some research!)
Although it is not my place to do as such, I feel the relevant need to say sorry on the behalf of anyone who has flamed this post, purely because the mentioning of sexuality was brought up. I'll not speak further on that matter, though. I do hope this thread stays up; If it doesn't @LadyRhian ; Would you mind if I copied the entire text and saved it? I'd like to read it every now and again, it's a marvelous read!
I think you @LadyRhian and @Ward are both annoyed/irritated by the same thing here.
The thead after thread about sexuality attracting trolls, causing arguements, and fighting. Whereas you @LadyRhian realise why it happens, you wish it didn't; @Ward just doesn't get why it happens at all, and wishes the whole subject (which he sees as pointless) would go away.
lol.
@fitscotgaymer Ours is not to question why...
Should society (including you) ostracize him on that ground in your view? Should we maybe make a themed romance in an RPG?
*rolls eyes*
Was there any need for you to go there? Really? With mods in and out of this thread?
So I am safe knowing that mods will not ostracize me.
Morality is something that is personal to a person, and changes from person to person depending on their point of view and experiences.
Thus, someone might think it immoral to sleep with someone outside of wedlock. And someone might not. That doesn't mean either party is wrong.
But neither party has the right to step on the rights of the other based on that moral outlook.
Acting on pedophilia is a highly illegal not to mention physically and psychologically damaging act to a child, and often more than one child.
Most "moral objections" come from personal opinion on something that frankly doesnt affect the person doing the objecting. Pedophilia is illegal precisely because it IS indeed damaging, and does indeed affect other people.
It is akin to rape, not homosexuality.
Laws are made for a very good reason, not just because society at large "doesn't like" something.
Neither @Ward nor myself, nor anyone else suggested that "society" didn't have the right to censure people for ILLEGAL, damaging, and abusive acts.
And insinuating otherwise... I don't even have the words...
For example, earlier, in my country homosexualism used to be outlawed, plain and simple. In Saudi Arabia, AFAIK, it is normal to have a hand hacked off for thievery. In California, AFAIK, homosexual marriages are allowed officially. In Netherlands, the prostitution is a legal business.
What I mean to say with that, is that the statement "Society has to accept people of all morals" is senseless at best, and harmful for the societies at worst.
Okay.
Not arguing with you. You know it is a vastly different thing. You know what the guy meant, and you know what I meant. You are deliberately being obtuse and "misunderstanding" to provoke an arguement.
Not happening.
Yes you are, if you are refusing to see or think about why making that sort of assumption about someone is rude.
I mean how would you like it if people started making all sorts of assumptions about you without knowing you at all?
If I said you must have some sort of weird kitten/cat fetish, simply cos of your username?
Rude isn't it?
I don't know the first thing about who you are, and it isn't my or anyone elses place to make assumptions like that.
Which was my point.
@fitscotgaymer : I don't see how @Kitteh_On_A_Cloud's statement is in any way rude. I mean, through religion restrictions or not... Homosexuality *is* a minority. It's a statistical fact. I know one might take offense, but take for example my country : two million inhabitants - not many. We were in fact also atheist until 1991, simply because religion was a crime in a dictatorship. Statistics aren't always 100% correct, true, but statistics still say that in 2009, there were one thousand homosexuals in our country. That's 1/2000 in comparison.
I mean, don't take offense if Kitteh here just makes an assumption about a certain statistic - that's in no way offensive, in my personal opinion. I am heterosexual, true, but I don't see why all this fuss must be made simply because of sexuality. Good lord, we don't have the inquisition any more, people don't get hunted - or at least, not EVERYWHERE (sadly there are places, discrimination exists, but if we fight over such small facts, then how are we to fix that big big problem?)
Assumptions aren't made to be rude, they are made to discuss a certain subject -they can be true, or not. In this case, statistically, what Kitteh_On_A_Cloud said, is true. If we make an assumption that I'm a moron - it might be true, it might be not. I'm not taking offense, I'll just see what happens out of it. To my defense - I like cheese. But this is a bad example because that's not an assumption related to statistics. It's a different thing, so you can't compare the two - that's why fetishes can't be compared to statistics.
@Kholdstare I would make an argument here for publisher bias and market share being possible reasons why there's very little presence of LGBT peoples in the Forgotten Realms world. There could be author bias too, but it doesn't seem to be coming from Ed Greenwood. These books are read by a lot of kids and GLBT kid's literature is a very edgy, touchy subject that makes h8ers go wild. I bet some FR authors would love to explore this subject but can't sell it to the managing editors. Sales would drop.
You clearly missed the qualifiers in my statement lol.
I said it would be rather rude IF he/she was making assumptions about people he/she doesn't know anything about, and frankly would be none of his/her business to make; and it would be obtuse if he/she was unwilling to consider why that would be rude.
I didn't say he/she was being rude.
Also rude and offensive are not the same thing.
Rudeness is largely related to manners and courtesy. Having consideration for the viewpoints of others, or lack thereof.
Offensiveness is usually related to being outright nasty, horrible, or mean to people for reasons.
My advisory that you really shouldn't make assumptions about people at all when you know nothing about them has nothing to do with the fact that homosexuality is a minority.
Trust me I know better than you that I am not part of the majority.
The best thing to do, if you are as an accepting and tolerant human being that you may like to think you are, would be to assume nothing about a person you don't know. Good or bad. As much as you can anyway.
My point I guess would be this.
Treat everyone the same, when you first meet them and when you don't know them.
EDIT:
Perhaps I can clear up what I mean.
When you make an assumption about a person you don't know, you are setting up in your head what you think that person is like. And that speaks to how you treat them.
And if you later find out that you were wrong in your assumption about them, then it will change how you treat them. Perhaps positively, perhaps negatively.
Either way it would be unfair on that person, because it would be a shift in how you treat them that was nothing to do with who they are, what they did, or how your relationship with that person is developing.
Example:
You are Mister A. You Mister A are into Football/Soccer in a big way. You are also athletic.
You meet Mister B. Mister B is also into Football/Soccer in a big way. He is also athletic. You met at a match.
You think you might get on with Mister B. Seems like you have things in common. He seems nice. You assume that he is a red blooded heterosexual male.
You decide to invite Mister B out for a friendly drink at your local bar.
You have a great time with the guy. You find out some more things you have in common, and somethings that you don't but hey thats cool because he seems like a great guy. You could be great friends.
You meet up a few more times to do things that would traditionally be associated as heterosexual male pasttimes. Because those are both your interests, and you both must be straight right?
The, Mister B thinking your a cool dude and all round awesome guy, introduces you to his boyfriend.
Suddenly Mister B isn't your buddy anymore. Suddenly he is a sneaky gay. You have nothing against gay people but you are annoyed he didn't tell you he was gay, or do or say something to make it obvious, cos you know he should have.
You don't know any gay people. It confuses you that he is gay, because he seemed so much like you. So straight. So normal. How can he be gay? Is he sure?
But you decide all of that is none of your business. Your an accepting and tolerant modern man. He's still your Gay Buddy. And you don't care. He will stay your Gay Buddy.
But Mister B isn't stupid, he realises you thought he was straight and don't really know how to deal with him being Gay.
He knows you like him as a friend, and gets that you want to stay friends; but he realises that he is suddenly your Gay Friend. And not just your friend anymore.
And that sudden change. That feeling, and perception that you no longer view him as "normal". That will hurt.
Because of your initial assumption that, hey he must be straight cos most people are, made you treat him one way. And finding out he isn't straight, will make you treat him different.
You have a Gay Buddy now. But he just wants to be your buddy.
Do you see what I am getting at?
It doesn't matter if you mean for it to happen, how you treat that person will change if you make erroneous assumptions about them to start with that you later find out isn't true.
And that will affect them.
Take the above example and take out the heterosexual assumption. Mister B would have become your buddy without qualification on his own merits, and not because of any assumptions you made about him. And he woulda stayed just your buddy after the "gay revelation" because of how you became friends in the first place.
Recently there was an episode of How I Met Your Mother (by which I mean I recently saw an episode that had aired last season...I'm way behind, leave me alone) where two guys [briefly] considered adopting a child together despite being straight. And I actually thought, you know what? There's totally nothing wrong with that. Because sexuality is a spectrum, and two responsible adults should be able to make the decision to start a family together without wanting to make out or even kiss.
Of course, in How I Met Your Mother it didn't work out because one of the dudes was bat-nuts crazy and wanted to buy the kid a pet cobra, but in other circumstances and with a different pair of individuals I can see how it would work out great.
...Kinda got derailed there. I think my point was that I try not to assume that anyone is gay or straight, but rather that everyone is open to anything (in terms of their sexual alignment) as long as they're not predisposed against it--and really, without asking them, how can you be sure?
Haha, hardest to earn aaaayyyyeeee :P