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Ah, the good old "inclusiveness hampers creativity" argument, or "is there a really, really, REALLY good story enhancing reason why this bartender isn't white?".That's nowhere near what I'm saying, and you know it.
I'm not saying there should need to be a reason for it; I'm saying the opposite. I'm saying there should be reason to call attention to it if you do so (like if the character was cursed and shares the story with you, or they have a story that happens to mention it, or if it's just physically obvious and a PC asks). I don't think a character description is going to include "Yeah, this messenger you just met that's going to give you the envelope with your orders in it is human, pretty tall, has brown hair, he's wearing some beaten-up-looking chainmail, has a light mace hung on a loop on his belt, and over his chainmail he's wearing a tabard with the words I'M A TRANSSEXUAL, ASK ME ABOUT IT messily embroidered in a circle around the royal army's emblem in blue thread. He looks to have been waiting here for a while, and so seems happy to see you've finally arrived." and I doubt in casual conversation they'd just blurt out "So, you're on your way to the Scary Forest of No Not-Scary Things, then? By the way, I used to be a woman." It instead would probably be something written on the sheet the GM has, and you could probably find out with a check to gather information just like finding out where his homeland is or what food he hates. Drawing undue attention makes something seem weird and sets people on tangents. It shouldn't be something super-important; it should be just another fact about the character, like their sexuality or their blood type, unless it's relevant. To use your bartender analogy, it would be rather jarring for a character in a movie to go up to him and say "So, what's it like being Asian?" rather than interacting as normal, or for him to bring up a big backstory about "I was always ostracized at college because everyone told me 'Koreans can't be...
Placing text that states a characters ethnicity is not the same as someone asking "What's it like to be xxxx?" There are a number of assumptions made about characters (white, straight, cis, etc), and text or spoken word don't have the visual benefit that film does. Without calling out a character as not conforming to those assumptions they effectively are those things the bulk of the time. This is not the same as asking, "What's it like being xxxx?" It presents information about the character to give that character depth. Noting that a characters parents were killed by gnolls when the character was a child is never challenged because it gives insight into the characters motivations. To say that culture, orientation, gender identification, religion, and many others aren't at least as important in a persons make up is ridiculous. These are things that have shaped and impacted a persons development every single day of their lives.
Do I NEED to have characters that look like me, or act like, me or speak like me in the things I do. No, I don't. I have spent the bulk of my life without those kinds of characters being present in the things I enjoy. I will manage if they're not there. I absolutely do appreciate it when they are though. It's the difference between saying, "Hey, that looks pretty cool! Is it alright if I join in?" and being told, "Hey, here's this pretty cool thing! It would be great if you joined in!"
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Personaly i would also welcome a Trans Men Iconic or even one as the protagonist of a novel.
Providing a diversity of positive male role models is something that really falls short in too many ways, yet it is the key to the success of many other things.
It makes my heart happy to see the ideas of trans men and positive male role models explicitly linked. :-)
RPG Superstar 2008 Top 6, Contributor
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Forgot about Reiko, good catch, pH! Yeah, genderfluid =/= transmasculine, but it's a facet that's also underrepresented in our hobby, so once again, excellent marks to Paizo for extending the banner of inclusiveness!
It's at most a line or two rather than a developed character, but the Rakehell (ruler of Duskport in Ilvarandin) is genderfluid. Loosely inspired by Orlando, particularly how the character was presented in the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.
(yes, not a trans man, but the post caught my eye)
Assistant Developer
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The unfortunate part of feeling the absolute NEED to do so, rather than doing it because it's what is desired in making something, can shift the priority to making a 100% inclusive creation and therefore shift making a GOOD creation to the #2 spot (that isn't so say that something can't be both, obviously, or that it WILL change priorities). If someone starts a thread saying "I want an X that identifies as Y; they've always been excluded!" then I would hope you're only going to put that in if you find that to be a good idea and the thread gave you the inspiration for a concept or you had already an idea of adding that (or something like it) independently, rather than JUST because someone complained. It's good to know that you're thinking of the wide influence by example; just don't let that take over the creative direction and have making a good product take a back seat.
I'm not criticising Paizo of anything - I was addressing the trend of people outright complaining when anything doesn't have one little thing specifically pointed out and made a big deal of. For all we know, a tenth of the population of Golarion could be trans men or any other kind of distinct personality, but it's just never come up.
Probably the easiest (and subtlest; probably best, too) way to be inclusive of things people are concerned about would be to design an updated Character Sheet layout and, among any other changes, include a spot for gender identity (as not only would it likely satisfy plenty of people wanting for inclusiveness, but it could also be helpful for all the kinds of asexual or hermaphroditic creatures/creature types) or whatever else would be of use to know on a character sheet. It would also add that feeling of legitimacy for those that run homebrew settings rather than published material.
I also agree with Oncoming_Storm that the effort is there. Furthermore, the addressed existence of trans women in the setting sort of implies the existence of trans men, too, so I'm not sure there's much to get in a huff over.
But here's the thing: Sometimes what you need to do because you want to be a good company, and what you desire to do coincide. I came to Paizo gung-ho to add more trans people to our canon. I love, doing it. It's easily the best thing about my job, and I have a lot of awesome things about my job. And we don't generally force ourselves to include other minorities as well. Usually what happens is someone says "Wow, we are not including many black characters in or products," or a fan says "hey, you don't have any positive portrayals of people of size," and out reaction is overwhelmingly "oh damn, you're right. We could absolutely make some characters to fill those gaps! I have a great idea! I want to write this!"
Sometimes there's a little fight over who gets to write that thing then. Mark Moreland usually wins, because he cheats.
Overall our goal isn't to tick off boxes in a social justice checksheet. We literally make a product about putting everyone in the driver seat of fantasy epics. We want everyone to know they have a place in our world and a seat at the table. We're not gritting our teeth and saying "Fine, we'll include a trans man if it'll get us a brownie point." We're saying "crap, we did not even notice that! Let's highlight a few of the trans men that obviously exist somewhere in Golarion, living their lives unnoticed until now."
And for the OP...
Thanks for bringing this up. The lack of trans men is at least partially on me. I consider myself Paizo's on-staff champion for transgender diversity, and I've let this slip past too many times. You would have had an awesome trans man. Ptemenib--your NPC assistant--was a trans man in my early drafts of Empty Graves, but I chickened out because it was my first AP, I wasn't out to my coworkers, and I was afraid to push boundaries. I was afraid, and you suffered for it. I'm genuinely sorry.
I almost added a trans man to Divinity Drive, but couldn't figure out a good way to make it relevant; the adventure is essentially a dungeon crawl, and it's hard to give anyone by boss monsters any personality in those scenarios (and I really didn't want our first showcased trans man to be a bad guy). So the first thing I did in hell's Rebels was go to James and say "I will include a trans man as one of the major NPCs in this volume. How do we want to make that work?" And James thought it was a great idea and was shocked we were only just now getting around to including a trans man. I really hope the result is worth the wait, and at this point I intend to be more conscious of trans masculine people we present as background elements.
Sorry for making you wait so long, and thank you for reminding us of our blind spots.
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Re: Ptemenib, I was going to pull the trigger on that anyway... it's a great idea.
Yeah, originally his ability to see invisible psychopomps was because he was transgender; just a strange quirk of the multiverse. I still regret not leaving him explicitly trans.
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RPG Superstar 2008 Top 6, Contributor
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I'm not sure the Rakehell is an intellect devourer... let me check.
LCoG is extremely vague, save that it implies a single being of shifting gender (rather than an intellect devourer in a series of bodies). As Russ Taylor said, though, it's barely a footnote.
Presumably NOT an intellect devourer, but it's not out of the question. Trust no one. As a plot hook for the home audience and/or future development, anything could happen.
The fluidity would be part of the host body even if Rakehell's being worn.
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Re: Ptemenib, I was going to pull the trigger on that anyway... it's a great idea.Yeah, originally his ability to see invisible psychopomps was because he was transgender; just a strange quirk of the multiverse. I still regret not leaving him explicitly trans.
Probably for the best. "Minority with special magic powers because he's a minority" is a trope with unfortunate connotations at best.
Seems like that would have been a Magical Negro but with a trans person instead of a black man.
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The fluidity would be part of the host body even if Rakehell's being worn.Presumably NOT an intellect devourer, but it's not out of the question. Trust no one. As a plot hook for the home audience and/or future development, anything could happen.I'm not sure the Rakehell is an intellect devourer... let me check.
LCoG is extremely vague, save that it implies a single being of shifting gender (rather than an intellect devourer in a series of bodies). As Russ Taylor said, though, it's barely a footnote.
"Consumer (OmnNomNom) Reports just ranked the 4714 DoppleGänger CR5+ Grand Tourer as their Conveyance of the Year®. Classic styling, responsive handling, and greater interior room with the Golarion-renowned abolethian reliability we've all come to expect."
How does one show identification as a man for a stereotypically male dominated profession like an adventurer where acting like "just one of the boys" is almost the norm?
Ptemenib--your NPC assistant--was a trans man in my early drafts of Empty Graves, but I chickened out because it was my first AP, I wasn't out to my coworkers, and I was afraid to push boundaries. I was afraid, and you suffered for it. I'm genuinely sorry.
I'm keeping this in mind if I run Empty Graves. Be interesting to see how a trans-man would work in a society that seems to have a lot of bare-chested men around.
Don't feel bad about it though. Ptemenib is a fine character. Do you have any material lying around on how his trans identity would have been incorporated into the story. Like how Irabeth sold her family sword to get the potion for Anevia in Wrath of the Righteous?
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On a different topic, since you guys mention liking feedback. All of our less-than-good iconics seem to be white, straight, cis, men. It doesn't bother me that much, but I have noticed.
Re: Ptemenib, I was going to pull the trigger on that anyway... it's a great idea.Yeah, originally his ability to see invisible psychopomps was because he was transgender; just a strange quirk of the multiverse. I still regret not leaving him explicitly trans.Probably for the best. "Minority with special magic powers because he's a minority" is a trope with unfortunate connotations at best.
Seems like that would have been a Magical Negro but with a trans person instead of a black man.
On the other hand, a lot of cultures ascribe magical powers to people who are between two genders, such as the Berdache of some Native American cultures.
Well... ALL intellect devourers are genderfluid. That's sort of kinda one of their whole points.
Isn't this the case with a lot of Aberration types, though?
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How does one show identification as a man for a stereotypically male dominated profession like an adventurer where acting like "just one of the boys" is almost the norm?
Why are you making the assumption that adventuring is a male-dominated profession?
Re: Ptemenib, I was going to pull the trigger on that anyway... it's a great idea.Yeah, originally his ability to see invisible psychopomps was because he was transgender; just a strange quirk of the multiverse. I still regret not leaving him explicitly trans.Probably for the best. "Minority with special magic powers because he's a minority" is a trope with unfortunate connotations at best.
Seems like that would have been a Magical Negro but with a trans person instead of a black man.
Paizo literally has a Magical Negro in their setting though, his name is Old Man Jatembe.
How does one show identification as a man for a stereotypically male dominated profession like an adventurer where acting like "just one of the boys" is almost the norm?Why are you making the assumption that adventuring is a male-dominated profession?
Why are you assuming it isn't?
I see a storm coming...
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Why are you assuming it isn't?How does one show identification as a man for a stereotypically male dominated profession like an adventurer where acting like "just one of the boys" is almost the norm?Why are you making the assumption that adventuring is a male-dominated profession?
...she's not. That would involve saying something like, "Adventuring is not a male-dominated profession."
How does one show identification as a man for a stereotypically male dominated profession like an adventurer where acting like "just one of the boys" is almost the norm?Why are you making the assumption that adventuring is a male-dominated profession?
100 years of science fiction/fantasy adventure stories with disproportionately male casts.
Most players are male, most people play their own gender most of the time, so most adventurers played are male.
High risk high reward occupations tend to attract males IRL and that carries over in a lot of fiction
Adventuring NPCs seem to be male more often than female.
]More importantly, how does being trans have anything to do with working in a "stereotypically male dominated profession"? Gender roles aren't gender identification. A woman isn't a transman if she wants to take a stereotypically male job. A transman isn't less of a transman if he wants a stereotypically female job.
What I was wondering is how one, as a writer, would show the gender identification or how it would play out story wise. I'm not implying that anyone isi less of anything, just that it seems really hard to show.
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, his name is Old Man Jatembe.
Aroden
Hin Jo
really, not having him would have more implications than having him.
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Why are you making the assumption that adventuring is a male-dominated profession?100 years of science fiction/fantasy adventure stories with disproportionately male casts.
Most players are male, most people play their own gender most of the time, so most adventurers played are male.
High risk high reward occupations tend to attract males IRL and that carries over in a lot of fiction
Adventuring NPCs seem to be male more often than female.
Most of the female NPCs make enough wealth to retire early to Crone Island, filling their evenings with moonlight dancing, tacos, and margaritas.
Most of the female NPCs make enough wealth to retire early to Crone Island, filling their evenings with moonlight dancing, tacos, and margaritas.Why are you making the assumption that adventuring is a male-dominated profession?100 years of science fiction/fantasy adventure stories with disproportionately male casts.
Most players are male, most people play their own gender most of the time, so most adventurers played are male.
High risk high reward occupations tend to attract males IRL and that carries over in a lot of fiction
Adventuring NPCs seem to be male more often than female.
Right. Perhaps the gender life gap is even bigger in an magical adventuring society?
It could then be speculated that a trans man would have a higher life expectancy.I remember seing an old kung fu movie where one of the villains became a women in order to master his chi, kung fu and attain a prolonged or eternal life. Badass movie.
To answer BNW, that´s exactly the point where to start.
Representation doesn´t always show the truth and even if it was different, things are getting changed now, to the better (mostly).
Having diverse positive male role models is very important, else same s~@@ gets repeated again and again.
For writers there are many ways to show gender identification.
One of the most direct ways (in a novel) are probably inner monologues, but also how the character would act and react with external stimuli and other persons. Or goals and motives.
For an adventure where you don´t have inner monologues it´s more difficult. You can have background information that then needs to be transported by the GM. But you can also have other "hints". Private rooms, journals, clothing and of course direct interaction with the NPC.
Gender identification is something that always needs to be communicated - and often being negotiated too - if it is wished to be recognized or somehow significant for the situation.
Therefore an NPC wishing to be adressed with a title that doesn´t fit the gender could be a hint. So many possibilities there.
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It was stated on numerous occasions that Golarion is far more of an equal-opportunity-for-adventure place with female adventurers being something of a common sight. What we do perceive is a distortion caused by the fact that majority of p'n'p RPGers are male and tend towards playing male characters. All the more reason to promote a more balanced gender ratio in our hobby!
But there is hope. My Skulls'n'Shackles game is 3 ladies and 2 gentlemen, and my Reign of Winter game is 3 guys and 2 gals. And I'm running an all-female group SOON. Hopefully, a generation later or so, an average gaming table will be much more diverse than it is now.
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*Glances in*
As a straight, white, cis male, I appreciate Paizo's efforts to step up and represent various kinds of minority groups in the ways they'd like to be represented. It's easy to forget about other views simply because, well, most people don't spend their days thinking about groups they don't interact with much. That you've all made a deliberate effort to try and overcome that really does mean a lot. ^^
One obvious approach would be to have something from the transman's past come back to haunt him. Family or other people who knew him as a woman and don't accept that he isn't.
Ok, but if there are no gender roles, there is no gender behavior, and gender identity is completely separate from orientation, what would being known "as a man" or for that matter, "as a woman" even mean?
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Why are you assuming it isn't?How does one show identification as a man for a stereotypically male dominated profession like an adventurer where acting like "just one of the boys" is almost the norm?Why are you making the assumption that adventuring is a male-dominated profession?
Because we've said it isn't.
Many, many times.
Goblin heroes we need more heroic goblins.
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100 years of science fiction/fantasy adventure stories with disproportionately male casts.How does one show identification as a man for a stereotypically male dominated profession like an adventurer where acting like "just one of the boys" is almost the norm?Why are you making the assumption that adventuring is a male-dominated profession?
That's their problem, not Golarion's.
Most players are male, most people play their own gender most of the time, so most adventurers played are male.
No, most visible players are male. But most spaces where players are visible to other players--conventions, online forums, and organized play programs--are unwelcoming to women, which means that the perception of who's playing becomes skewed based on the makeup of those environments.
High risk high reward occupations tend to attract males IRL and that carries over in a lot of fiction
High-risk, high-reward occupations also tend to be overtly hostile to women.
They're not inherently male professions any more than computer programming is an inherently male profession. (Remember programming? Remember how most of the first programmers were women? Until it became perceived as prestigious instead of a clerical job, and men pushed women out and erased records of their contributions? Remember how archaeologists assumed Vikings buried with swords were all male until recently, when more sophisticated testing techniques revealed half of them were female?)
Male-dominated professions in the real world actively exclude women, through discrimination, harassment, and often violence. They're not male-dominated because women naturally don't want to do those jobs--they're male-dominated because men have made those jobs unpleasant or downright dangerous for women.
Adventuring NPCs seem to be male more often than female.
Not in Pathfinder.
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Yay for Jessica, f@@$ing awesome post:-)
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One obvious approach would be to have something from the transman's past come back to haunt him. Family or other people who knew him as a woman and don't accept that he isn't.Ok, but if there are no gender roles, there is no gender behavior, and gender identity is completely separate from orientation, what would being known "as a man" or for that matter, "as a woman" even mean?
*puts on sunglasses*
What if I told you...
...that the need to Be A Man! (or be a woman) was a societal construct that isn't necessary for human societies to function...?
I don't even begin to know how to respond. There's a fundamental gap here I'm not seeing.
Its the space between my ears.
Whether there are gender roles or not, a women crossing one of those gender boundaries doesn't become a man. A female soldier doesn't become male when she joins the army. Nor does who she wants to sleep with change that.
Thats correct. But combine ALL of the following
Gender is different than sex
There is no gendered behavior
There are no gender roles
Then what is gender? It seems to have been left as almost a null set.
A lot of things that are insightful.
Acknowledgement of blind spots is always commendable, but not nearly as much as the demonstrated and proven avoidance of tokenism.
While not my 'thing', I have more than enough faith in the staff, writers, and publisher to alleviate fears I once had of pandering done badly...with the exception of one particular writer who was a bit salty about terrible puns about aesthetics.
There's a reason Shardra may not be my favorite iconic, but that I feel is one of the best written. My actual favorite is something of a toss-up, due to being biased towards a trio of divinely empowered/themed individuals who don't suffer from being overly preachy sorts, preferring to proselytize by deed rather than word.
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*puts on sunglasses*
What if I told you...
...that the need to Be A Man! (or be a woman) was a societal construct that isn't necessary for human societies to function...?
It's also a lyric from an awesome Disney song.
*puts on sunglasses*
What if I told you...
...that the need to Be A Man! (or be a woman) was a societal construct that isn't necessary for human societies to function...?
I would say that ignoring a trend can be just as problematic as ignoring individual exceptions.
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I'm not gonna lie, i really expected that to link to something from Frozen, i'm sorry for that:-D
but yes that is a really great song, one of my daughter's favorite disney movies:-)
edit: Smurf! ninja'd again! not even on my phone:-D
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More importantly, how does being trans have anything to do with working in a "stereotypically male dominated profession"? Gender roles aren't gender identification. A woman isn't a transman if she wants to take a stereotypically male job. A transman isn't less of a transman if he wants a stereotypically female job.What I was wondering is how one, as a writer, would show the gender identification or how it would play out story wise. I'm not implying that anyone is less of anything, just that it seems really hard to show.
Short answer: Subtly
Longer answer: First you have to figure out the cues we use to distinguish male and female on a social level. Then you play around with those cues. Have the person you are portraying either do these clumsily (if they're new at it) or go out of their way to display them (if they have something to prove). Or display mixed signals and not care. What is this person's relationship to themself, or to the society around them? What do they want people to think? What is out of their control?
Details: Here's one description I've used, though a transman would probably not be nearly as negative about it.
"The trick to acting like a man is to concentrate on straight lines and pushing down. Push down with the toe when you walk, instead of the heel, push down your voice till it’s flat and lifeless, push your hands down to your sides at all times, push your soul down into your shoes where it belongs and don’t worry about trampling it. And then widen your stance and your base, to support all that downward pressure."
*puts on sunglasses*
What if I told you...
...that the need to Be A Man! (or be a woman) was a societal construct that isn't necessary for human societies to function...?
I would say that ignoring a trend can be just as problematic as ignoring individual exceptions.
I'm not suggesting ignoring it. I'm suggesting understanding that it's not natural, and consciously rejecting it.
I'm not suggesting ignoring it. I'm suggesting understanding that it's not natural, and consciously rejecting it.
While I fully believe that society exaggerates it (often to harmful levels) I find the idea that its entirely manufactured to be beyond unlikely. The degree is unnatural. The trend is not.
We have half of the population soaking in a chemical known to cause aggression, violence, and (over) confidence along with the mechanisms to use that chemical right down to the cellular level. How on earth could that not result in some changes in behavior?
In this context: Gender is the sex in your head. When it doesn't match the sex in your body, there is internal conflict - the body doesn't match who you are. Gender Dysphoria.
And in our world that unfortunately results in far external conflict. On golarion with little if not no gender roles and orientation isn't that big of a deal that conflict would be almost entirely internal and thus VERY hard to bring out.
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No, most visible players are male. But most spaces where players are visible to other players--conventions, online forums, and organized play programs--are unwelcoming to women, which means that the perception of who's playing becomes skewed based on the makeup of those environments.
This is by nature a social game. Players have to be visible to other players at some point. What you're asserting is that there are enough female leaning home games to make up for both all of the male leaning home games people talk about and the conventions, online forums, organized play along with succeeding despite the increased difficulty of finding groups.
Not only does that seem dubious to start with, but it would also mean that conventions, online forums, and organized play do not attract players which would make their existence a bit of a head-scratch.
Male-dominated professions in the real world actively exclude women, through discrimination, harassment, and often violence. They're not male-dominated because women naturally don't want to do those jobs--they're male-dominated because men have made those jobs unpleasant or downright dangerous for women.
Its not an or issue. One reason does not exclude another. (in fact they tend to spiral of each other)
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No, most visible players are male. But most spaces where players are visible to other players--conventions, online forums, and organized play programs--are unwelcoming to women, which means that the perception of who's playing becomes skewed based on the makeup of those environments.This is by nature a social game. Players have to be visible to other players at some point. What you're asserting is that there are enough female leaning home games to make up for both all of the male leaning home games people talk about and the conventions, online forums, organized play along with succeeding despite the increased difficulty of finding groups.
Not only does that seem dubious to start with, but it would also mean that conventions, online forums, and organized play do not attract players which would make their existence a bit of a head-scratch.
You have a vastly exaggerated idea of the importance of those venues.
Stats at companies I've worked with who had pretty extensive demographic tracking--Paizo doesn't, because our game isn't digital--suggested that at the low end, there were 100 people reading forums and never registering or posting for every one that posted. Convention demographics are changing--in fact, women are a slight majority at some categories of geek conventions now--but game-focused cons, alas, still lag far behind).
The people who are visible are a small fraction of the player base, and a highly self-selecting one. They're not representative of the player base as a whole, any more than Congress is representative of the demographics of the US.
And not only are they not representative demographically, but--at least for the games I've worked on that had good tracking--they're not representative behaviorally, in play style, purchasing, or anything else. E.g. on one game, the vast majority of forum posters were male and focused on pvp combat. The vast majority of players from in-game data, however, spent most of their in-game time exploring and avoided pvp combat. They were also, where they were willing to report, ~40% female. But looking at the community, you would have assumed that female players were rare, and most people were interested in battling other players.
We don't have that sort of data for Pathfinder, because it's not a video game. But there is zero reason to believe it doesn't follow the same patterns. If anything, it's less overtly "masculine" than many MMOs and FPSs, for which we do have that sort of data.
Male-dominated professions in the real world actively exclude women, through discrimination, harassment, and often violence. They're not male-dominated because women naturally don't want to do those jobs--they're male-dominated because men have made those jobs unpleasant or downright dangerous for women.Its not an or issue. One reason does not exclude another. (in fact they tend to spiral of each other)
No, one reason doesn't automatically exclude another. But one reason can definitely be covered up by the insistence on another, which is largely what's happened in those professions. Men discriminate against, harass, and abuse women in those professions, and then when they succeed in chasing us out, they claim we're not in it because women just naturally aren't drawn to tech, or the military, or engineering. Or heck, to being professional chefs.