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Mass Effect Andromeda's poor handling of LGBT

Stoze

Member
The achievement just seems like an unfortunate oversight, they could've just made it 2 instead of 3 if they caught it in time. Not having a gay squad mate is lame though. That screenshot with that trans character just seems way out of touch, very poorly written and laughably cliche.

I think they definitely could've done a bit better and I think it's good this stuff got pointed out, but overall I got the impression they handled things pretty well on the progressive front. I could be wrong though.
 

Sibylus

Banned
Folks, it's deadnaming. This is well within the bounds of the term's usage and the criticism is within bounds. Seems like a really clear-cut example of "did not do the research" combined with a character written to violate their own motives just to feed the player a deeply invasive and touchy bit of backstory. It's badly written in terms of internal logic and not just a badly written coming out.
 

Harlequin

Member
I think it's weird that gay men and straight women have the fewest romantic options. In what world do lesbians have more options than straight women? And sign me up.

In a world that caters to male heterosexual masturbatory fantasies. (Which isn't in and of itself a bad thing. I have no problem with porn or sexualisation in general, I have no problem with companies or products catering to a specific target audience but in this case we're talking about an established company with a certain reputation for being progressive and inclusive and a fanbase that trusted them to do better than this.)
 

Kinsei

Banned
I can't believe I'm saying this, but this whole thing reeks of tokenism. It's like they didn;t really care about the M/M relationships and only threw them in there because people expect them to be in a Bioware game.

That trans character is really bad. Honestly I would have preferred no representation.
 
I can't believe I'm saying this, but this whole thing reeks of tokenism. It's like they didn;t really care about the M/M relationships and only threw them in there because people expect them to be in a Bioware game.

That trans character is really bad. Honestly I would have preferred no representation.
I wouldn't, because the entire game seems poorly written.

It's not like these examples are against the grain, this is literally just how the game was written.
 

Stumpokapow

listen to the mad man
Harlequin's post is a good counter to this, though - it doesn't seem like the same care was put into gay male ryder options at all.

As I noted in my first post, I absolutely agree with any kind of complaint about the substance of the representation -- my only dissent is on the framing of the issue as one of counting options, and especially using the achievement as the frame. I should just make it very clear that I am participating in this conversation as someone who appreciates the aim but was unconvinced of the framing of the argument and would like to see it engaged in a way more similar to Harlequin's approach.

The bit about the sex scenes being far more tame

This subject is discussed a little bit in a film a decade or so ago called "This Film is Not Yet Rated" which explores the MPAA ratings system a little more broadly. One of the core arguments in the film is that lesbian/gay love/affection/sex end up being rated more "mature" than equivalent heterosexual scenes in a way that enforces a number of false and heteronormative claims. I think the same thing may be the case here -- and not necessarily due to ESRB ratings concerns (although possibly), but author self-censorship out of fear of these considerations.
 
'No character for gay male in the squad members', but Jaal is romanceable by Male Ryder.
Nope, that's been debunked.
Judge me if you will, but I was pretty hot to trot for Jaal, the male Angaran resistance fighter.

Despite what data miners have suggested, Jaal is only interested in females… and as Angarans are want to do, he likes a lot of females at once. Sadface.
http://stevivor.com/features/guides...de-heres-who-the-male-ryder-can-sleep-with/3/
 

Burbeting

Banned
As I noted in my first post, I absolutely agree with any kind of complaint about the substance of the representation -- my only dissent is on the framing of the issue as one of counting options, and especially using the achievement as the frame. I should just make it very clear that I am participating in this conversation as someone who appreciates the aim but was unconvinced of the framing of the argument and would like to see it engaged in a way more similar to Harlequin's approach.



This subject is discussed a little bit in a film a decade or so ago called "This Film is Not Yet Rated" which explores the MPAA ratings system a little more broadly. One of the core arguments in the film is that lesbian/gay love/affection/sex end up being rated more "mature" than equivalent heterosexual scenes in a way that enforces a number of false and heteronormative claims. I think the same thing may be the case here -- and not necessarily due to ESRB ratings concerns (although possibly), but author self-censorship out of fear of these considerations.

Taking only the achievement as a point of reference was a mistake from my part, I apology for it.

For the second part, even if that accounts as a part, the f/f sex scenes don't seem to have that same fade-to-black in effect as m/m does.
 

depths20XX

Member
I wouldn't, because the entire game seems poorly written.

It's not like these examples are against the grain, this is literally just how the game was written.

Are they all this terribly written? I only played through half of the first game but that was so long ago I can't remember the writing.
 
You mean that there's no exclusively lesbian squadmate? That's true but there are two F/F romance options in the squad (both of whom are also romanceable by Scott but still) versus no M/M ones.

Yes, I thought the post was about exclusively gay romances, there are none from the squad for either female or male
 
I'm not really following the deadnaming thing. That screenshot doesn't seem to fit any of the definitions you posted? Not trying to be snarky; I've never heard the term before and I'm trying to understand.
 
As I noted in my first post, I absolutely agree with any kind of complaint about the substance of the representation -- my only dissent is on the framing of the issue as one of counting options, and especially using the achievement as the frame. I should just make it very clear that I am participating in this conversation as someone who appreciates the aim but was unconvinced of the framing of the argument and would like to see it engaged in a way more similar to Harlequin's approach.

This subject is discussed a little bit in a film a decade or so ago called "This Film is Not Yet Rated" which explores the MPAA ratings system a little more broadly. One of the core arguments in the film is that lesbian/gay love/affection/sex end up being rated more "mature" than equivalent heterosexual scenes in a way that enforces a number of false and heteronormative claims. I think the same thing may be the case here -- and not necessarily due to ESRB ratings concerns (although possibly), but author self-censorship out of fear of these considerations.
Fair enough, perhaps the counting framing isn't helpful to discussion. If they are self-censoring out of fear of this though it really sucks, especially as the other BioWare team doesn't have this issue - Dorian's romance line in Inquisition is fairly explicit.
Are they all this terribly written? I only played through half of the first game but that was so long ago I can't remember the writing.
enjoy

edit: oh, no, this isn't about ME in general - the writing issue is primarily with Andromeda.
 

Prelude.

Member
Hasn't it always been poor? I am going through the series for the first time as female Shepard and my options aren't exactly great.

Do people actually care about "canon" sexuality? Wouldn't it be better if every character were romanceable by both genders?
 

Kinsei

Banned
Hasn't it always been poor? I am going through the series for the first time as female Shepard and my options aren't exactly great.

Do people actually care about "canon" sexuality? Wouldn't it be better if every character were romanceable by both genders?

Dragon Age 2 made every squad mate bisexual. People threw a hissy fit over it.
 

Harlequin

Member
Yes, I thought the post was about exclusively gay romances, there are none from the squad for either female or male

True but the diffeence is that female Ryders have two female LI options in their squad (whether they're gay or bi isn't all that relevant at this point) whereas male Ryders have none (neither gay nor bi).
 
I'm not really following the deadnaming thing. That screenshot doesn't seem to fit any of the definitions you posted? Not trying to be snarky; I've never heard the term before and I'm trying to understand.

The purpose of a deadname is to basically cast aside a name that you no longer wish to have associated with you. Trans people, in general, do not deadname themselves unless they are required to do so - bringing up your deadname only invites people to use it. It should also be noted that it is not simply a case of an individual person doing so, but in fact a character being written to do so.
 

Dryk

Member
Do people actually care about "canon" sexuality? Wouldn't it be better if every character were romanceable by both genders?
Personally I want more canon romantic and sexual preference in games. I don't actually like that everyone is romanceable as long as you're their preferred gender, it's simplistic.
 
The purpose of a deadname is to basically cast aside a name that you no longer wish to have associated with you. Trans people, in general, do not deadname themselves unless they are required to do so - bringing up your deadname only invites people to use it. It should also be noted that it is not simply a case of an individual person doing so, but in fact a character being written to do so.

Ohhhh, ok. That makes a lot of sense. Thanks.
 

Harlequin

Member
Didn't ME3 get an extra gay man romance option compared to lesbian options? If you didn't Virmire him.

I don't think so. ME3 had one bi male LI who you may have already killed off in a previous game and one gay male LI but it also had one bi female LI (well, we can probably argue over terminology since she's an asari but they read as female to us and she's romanceable by male and female Shepards) and one lesbian female LI.
 
True but the diffeence is that female Ryders have two female LI options in their squad (whether they're gay or bi isn't all that relevant at this point) whereas male Ryders have none (neither gay nor bi).

I know, I was just providing context for exclusive gay romances in the squad, at least that's what I think the original post was about?
 

someday

Banned
In a world that caters to male heterosexual masturbatory fantasies. (Which isn't in and of itself a bad thing. I have no problem with porn or sexualisation in general, I have no problem with companies or products catering to a specific target audience but in this case we're talking about an established company with a certain reputation for being progressive and inclusive and a fanbase that trusted them to do better than this.)
You're completely correct. One one hand I find it great that they've given us (lesbians) so many options, but on the other hand, I know it's just so dudes have more f/f sex scenes to watch, especially in light of the number of options gay men seem to have. The decision wasn't made to make us feel more included even though it has a similar effect.
 

Harlequin

Member
Not everyone has to be gay. The world is dynamic, randomization can be unfair.
Whoever made that trans thing is fucking stupid tho.

It's not just about the number of gay options, it's about it looking like they got far less attention than many of the straight/lesbian options and, based on what we know/have seen so far, generally feeling more like an afterthought.

I know, I was just providing context for exclusive gay romances in the squad, at least that's what I think the original post was about?

Fair enough, though I don't think it was. At least none of mine were (and they're quoted in the OP).
 

Stumpokapow

listen to the mad man
Folks, it's deadnaming. This is well within the bounds of the term's usage and the criticism is within bounds. Seems like a really clear-cut example of "did not do the research" combined with a character written to violate their own motives just to feed the player a deeply invasive and touchy bit of backstory. It's badly written in terms of internal logic and not just a badly written coming out.

Yeah, thinking at this, I think there's like two steps at work here.

The first is that given you're writing a trans character, the typical mode is to have them identify as trans or known to be trans (or to explicitly tell a transition story). So this is an approach done in OITNB, The L Word, Transparent, Transamerica, Boys Don't Cry, Sense8, The Danish Girl, etc...

This in contrast to just having someone incidentally be trans. But the issue being of course that the viewer or player will likely code them as cis, so you miss the benefit in terms of representation or exposure -- and you rely on some external cue like casting a trans actress/actor and using that to say something about the character (which is not ideal, the same way that casting an actor of the opposite gender to the character is not ideal, because it also probably plays into the pernicious belief that transfolk are analogous to an actor in drag or whatever even as it may be a performance that itself is transgressive and genderqueer)... or you have to have the author do a "Actually, Dumbledore is Gay", which I think again is not ideal.

But given that you wish to have the representation be overt, how do you portray it? Set aside the truly ugly options that many films and television shows resort to
this GLAAD article discusses the omnipresence of trans characters as killers, villains, sex workers [often "deceiving men", another awful stereotype], and victims -- really, truly awful, and I include here even the tendency of OITNB to define Sofia's identity by people hurling transphobic slurs at her and simply showing that she's tough enough to take them) and the remaining best options are either to use a flashback or narration framing device, or an exposition dumb. So with a flashback you can show someone's pre-transition life through the lens of the camera or narrator without needing to engage with why the person is discussing their pre-transition life or if that is true to the way she lives now. Or the other alternative is basically an exposition dump where the person announces they are trans. Which is almost certainly going to fail due to terrible writing, and it's probably going to fail in exactly the way this does.

So it sounds to me here that this is a reflect of ignorance borne of good intentions, where the thought process was:
- We want to be inclusive and tell a trans story
- How do we make it clear that the character is trans?
- Have them discuss their transition
- Okay, well, the way we do any characterization in our games is we just have them monologue their life story
- Bingo, all done!

And the result is bad writing which reads as tonedeaf, untrue to the trans experience, and hackneyed.

I think the need to back up good intentions with good results speaks to the value of having trans team members (and also not tokenizing them by using them as your Hey I Need You To Be The Voice Of All Trans People), listening to their ideas, and consulting with external groups who want to help on this stuff, rather than just a priori deciding "We want a trans character", writing what you think works, and settling for that.

(Honestly, I suspect they will patch the line to say "people knew me by another name, but that is never who I was" or some other similar line post release, but otherwise leave the clunky exposition dump)
 

Platy

Member
Re the poorly handled trans character, brings up an interesting counterpoint to the people who push back against those who say "sure but only if it's handled well" in regards to LGBT characters in games.

Having a trans character handed poorly is beter than a world where no trans character exists, like Breath of the Wild
 
They need to add a trophy for people who don't care about romance and don't like how all the relationships in the the series have been focused around a commander and their subordinate.
 

Five

Banned
Speaking as a trans woman myself, there's really no reason why any character in the story should be revealing the other character's birth name. It doesn't happen in real life for a reason; Transgender folks generally want to leave that stuff in the past.

Just, all around really silly writing.
Could you possibly help educate me? I'm wondering what the material difference is between the mass effect dialog and what you've done here. Superficially, both instances are transwoman identifying themselves as trans to provide context for a conversation. Why is it wrong for the ME character to admit she's trans when you've just done seemingly exactly the same thing?
 
If the MM sex scenes being tamer is true that's pretty pathetic. They went completely gratuitous with the MF scene I saw, almost unashamedly so. And then to turn around and meekly fade to black with male on male? Bleh.

To the poster above, could if have anything to do with the anonymity of the Internet? Also no names have been revealed by the poster either. Couple that with the character jumping right into saying their old name with no real context to a complete stranger the situation doesn't seem comparable to me.
 
Trans representation matters.

Listen, I believe in equal rights and representation in all things as much as anyone, but, no, it is absolutely NOT important for a videogame. This is especially true when the subject currently up for discussion isn't even a key focus of the game to begin with. Just because romancing or relationships are possible is not itself an automatic mandate that every type of relationship be represented. I ultimately don't know yet because I don't have the game of course, but even if they didn't make same sex relationships of any type possible, that, too, wouldn't somehow (at least in my view) be evidence of some kind of insensitivity or discrimination. If the developer decides it isn't something they want to explore in their game , that's very much their right. Same as if someone directing a movie decided they only wish to focus on one style of relationship.

I mean, you could say lesbians were left out or underrepresented in Moonlight. Where does it really stop?
 

VegiHam

Member
So yet again Mass Effect doesn't let me hook up with the cool and interesting aliens actually on my team and prominent in the game like all the other sexualities get to. Why are the gay dude options in this franchise all so boring? Where's my Garrus?!
 

Harlequin

Member
Could you possibly help educate me? I'm wondering what the material difference is between the mass effect dialog and what you've done here. Superficially, both instances are transwoman identifying themselves as trans to provide context for a conversation. Why is it wrong for the ME character to admit she's trans when you've just done seemingly exactly the same thing?

I'm not trans so I may be wrong here but I'm pretty sure that there's a difference between letting other people know that you're trans and giving them a name you probably associate a lot of negative experiences with and don't identify with.
 
Having a trans character handed poorly is beter than a world where no trans character exists, like Breath of the Wild

So having a black person who is a slave, broke out just to be a thief, loves rap, kfc, watermelon, basketball and say nigga every second word is better than not having any black people at all?
If you want to do something, do it properly, if you can't do it, don't.
There are a lot of ways to let the 0layer know that someone is a trans without making the trans person to break their character to tell everybody about it.
 

Stumpokapow

listen to the mad man
Listen, I believe in equal rights and representation in all things as much as anyone, but, no, it is absolutely NOT important for a videogame. This is especially true when the subject currently up for discussion isn't even a key focus of the game to begin with. Just because romancing or relationships are possible is not itself an automatic mandate that every type of relationship be represented. I ultimately don't know yet because I don't have the game of course, but even if they didn't make same sex relationships of any type possible, that, too, wouldn't somehow (at least in my view) be evidence of some kind of insensitivity or discrimination. If the developer decides it isn't something they want to explore in their game , that's very much their right. Same as if someone directing a movie decided they only wish to focus on one style of relationship.

I mean, you could say lesbians were left out or underrepresented in Moonlight. Where does it really stop?

You seem to be making two mutually contradictory arguments -- one is that it's a form of tokenism to worry about individual works rather than broad patterns of representation -- and the other is what you say, that representation is not important. They are very at odds and it'll probably help people reply to you if you made it clear which you meant.
 

Five

Banned
I'm not trans so I may be wrong here but I'm pretty sure that there's a difference between letting other people know that you're trans and giving them a name you probably associate a lot of negative experiences with and don't identify with.
Oh, okay. That makes way more sense. Thank you!
 
Could you possibly help educate me? I'm wondering what the material difference is between the mass effect dialog and what you've done here. Superficially, both instances are transwoman identifying themselves as trans to provide context for a conversation. Why is it wrong for the ME character to admit she's trans when you've just done seemingly exactly the same thing?

Here, a trans person made note of being trans in a thread about being trans.

In ME, a trans person made note of being trans (and deadnaming themselves) as the first thing you learn about them.
 

Platy

Member
Could you possibly help educate me? I'm wondering what the material difference is between the mass effect dialog and what you've done here. Superficially, both instances are transwoman identifying themselves as trans to provide context for a conversation. Why is it wrong for the ME character to admit she's trans when you've just done seemingly exactly the same thing?

There are basicaly 2 problems here :

1)You : Hello, nice to meet you !
Person X : Nice to meet you too, I love to have sex with vegetables

This is NOT you say in your second line in a game with huge dialog trees

2) and more importantly, deadnaming means supporting stuff like "yeah you say your name is Barbara but what is your REAL name ?" that transphobic people say all the time to deny our trans lifes (see ? makes sense to include the fact that I am trans in this conversation) as fake ones.

There was like 32 different ways to show that she is trans without needing to be this shitty.
Make an item description on her room that says that she takes female hormones, she says that she came for a surgery with Doctor X, than later you see that Doctor X is specialist in corrective sexual surgery, make you read her journal where she talks about preparation for her surgery .... Hell ! Even making a character saying transphobic shit to her would be better =P

So having a black person who is a slave, broke out just to be a thief, loves rap, kfc, watermelon, basketball and say nigga every second word is better than not having any black people at all?
If you want to do something, do it properly, if you can't do it, don't.
There are a lot of ways to let the 0layer know that someone is a trans without making the trans person to break their character to tell everybody about it.

I said poorly, not outright offensive
 

Dmax3901

Member
this one exception does not prove a point, though, and that argument is pretty much unanimously used as an excuse not to include trans characters at all.

imagine if people tried to use ride to hell: retribution's main character as an argument for why straight men should never star in games.

lol good point well made.
 
Listen, I believe in equal rights and representation in all things as much as anyone, but, no, it is absolutely NOT important for a videogame. This is especially true when the subject currently up for discussion isn't even a key focus of the game to begin with. Just because romancing or relationships are possible is not itself an automatic mandate that every type of relationship be represented. I ultimately don't know yet because I don't have the game of course, but even if they didn't make same sex relationships of any type possible, that, too, wouldn't somehow (at least in my view) be evidence of some kind of insensitivity or discrimination. If the developer decides it isn't something they want to explore in their game , that's very much their right. Same as if someone directing a movie decided they only wish to focus on one style of relationship.

I mean, you could say lesbians were left out or underrepresented in Moonlight. Where does it really stop?

They decided to include someone who is trans and did a poor job of it. And decided to include male on male relationships but did a poor job of it. If there was a lesbian in moonlight that was poorly represented criticism would be valid. Your point doesn't make any sense because it seems to attack an argument that isn't being made.
 

Sophia

Member
Could you possibly help educate me? I'm wondering what the material difference is between the mass effect dialog and what you've done here. Superficially, both instances are transwoman identifying themselves as trans to provide context for a conversation. Why is it wrong for the ME character to admit she's trans when you've just done seemingly exactly the same thing?

ALTTP above gave a good reason as to why dead naming is a bad thing.

The purpose of a deadname is to basically cast aside a name that you no longer wish to have associated with you. Trans people, in general, do not deadname themselves unless they are required to do so - bringing up your deadname only invites people to use it. It should also be noted that it is not simply a case of an individual person doing so, but in fact a character being written to do so.

But the big difference is that I didn't identify myself as trans for the sake of being trans, but rather to provide context for my opinion on the subject. I also didn't deadname myself and make things awkward for everyone.

And this goes back to what I said earlier: There are a ton of ways Bioware could have identified the character as trans without resorting to the character openly admitting it via deadnaming. A little bit of effort into the writing could have made all the difference in the world between a well written character, and a tactless one.

I'm not trans so I may be wrong here but I'm pretty sure that there's a difference between letting other people know that you're trans and giving them a name you probably associate a lot of negative experiences with and don't identify with.

You are absolutely correct. For me, personally, the fact that I am trans is not something that is a secret. At the same time, I don't really bring it up unless it's relevant to the conversation as it is here.
 

JerkShep

Member
Yikes, that writing for the trans character seems terrible. Like someone was trying to shoehorn it in.

Inquisition had something similar that felt very shoehorned in with one of the member's of Iron Bull's crew. Some of the dialogues option that you could choose were all sorts of terrible ("Why don't you use magic to change?" or something close enough). The character was good, but a couple of exchanges felt completely off.

The fact that the only options for gay male Ryder are basically glorified NPCs is all sort of terrible. Admittedly, Kaidan and Cortez in ME3 were not that great either (but ME3 fucked up a lot in that department, FemShep had basically half the options of MaleShep).

It's a shame that this is the best they could come up with after Dragon Age Inquisition had Dorian, which was a fantastic character all around, with probably one of the best developed relationship in the game.
 
seriously, omg

if they forced you into a m/m relationship for a trophy the anders outrage would look like nothing.
...Would it?

I don't recall any anger over being "forced" to kiss boys 20 times in order to perfect the 360 version of Bully.

Granted, kisses are smaller than full on romances, but still.
 
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