Staal said:
Starke said:
To be fair, a lot of your posts read like "unthinking aggression", so there's a bit of a paradox here. And I'm not trying to be my normal abrasive jackass self here.
I don't see where I have been unthinkingly aggressive. My stance is everyone is allowed to want themselves, their identity, represented in the game. Knight Templar's assertion that if a white person prefers a white romance option that they are racist qualifies quite clearly as "unthinking aggression" and bigotry.
I said "reads like", not "your posts demonstrate," or "your posts are filled with", and (with apologies to Knight Templar, as I haven't read all of your debate), what seems to be going on is the way you're writing your posts makes it look like you're coming at it from the whole "racial purity" angle.
Also, it's important to remember there are still people out there, on the internet and in the world, who were raised by actual racists, and believe that ethnically mixed relationships are a sin, and that there's nothing wrong, whatsoever, with discriminating against them.
Hence the "borderline racist" comments. You're walking a very fine line, appearing to be a part of that group, whatever your intentions.
Staal said:
I am merely holding up the mirror to those people who like to hold themselves up to be the enemy of bigotry all the while perpetuating a disdain for another group. I have adequately explained myself. If you refuse to accept the clear cut logical fallacy that Knight Templar is perpetuating well... I can't force you. But hopefully others that read this will think for themselves instead of jumping on the bandwagon.
Can you be xenophobic against the xenophobes?
Okay, but honestly, we do that anyway. I mean, I got flippant earlier, but here's the thing: We have cultural norms. We always have cultural norms. It's a function of society. This is right and that is wrong. It's not okay to kill someone and take their stuff, it is okay to defend yourself from someone else who is trying to kill you and take your stuff.
Things get viciously complicated when you have conflicting norms. You can see this today... well, I was going to bring up an independent example, but let's use your argument.
We've got people who were raised with a racist outlook, that say any relationship outside your own ethnicity is wrong. We've got people who were raised in cosmopolitan environments, where they were interacting with multiple cultures their entire life. For both groups, what the other is doing, on a regular basis, is something their norms term as wrong. We've got the people saying, it has to be with your own race, and you've got the people saying discriminating against someone is wrong.
Now, I know I'm being a bit basic here, but the crux is, you appear to be in the camp of "relationships outside your ethnicity is wrong", even though your point is a little more nuanced than that. Unfortunately, because there is a kind of binary decision people, as a whole, tend to assign to cultural norms, it ends up with you being painted with the, "oh, here's another racist" brush, even if that's not the case.
On the subject of DA2, there's probably a glib, "freedom is the freedom to be alone" crap, but, and this probably won't be a satisfying answer for you, but: DA2 gives you the option of a relationship with Isabella, it doesn't force you into a relationship with anyone... except Anders trying to jump you, and that was weird for many reasons. If the game was formatted so that you needed to be in a relationship with someone, your argument would probably be a bit less... let's say dubious sounding.
Staal said:
Starke said:
Though, you're actually bringing up two separate issues, a lot of mainstream media, at least in the US, has had an agenda of reducing xenophobia, and honestly, this has been going on for decades. It's been one of the most prominent focuses of science fiction since the genre's inception, and continues to be. I probably shouldn't call it an "agenda", but the senseless xenophobia in culture at large is something many writers have felt the need to speak out against, and because of cultural norms, they find themselves needing to speak out against it in an artificial context.
It still doesn't excuse BioWare's horrid response to legitimate complaints about their product.
Yeah, there are a lot of flaws with, well, most... no, every game Bioware's released since ME1. DA2 suffered from a hideously fast turnaround, to the point that there was a rumor going around a while ago that the version which shipped as retail was an alpha build.
That said, this is literally the first time I've seen someone complain about the absence of a same ethnicity romance in it. So, that's not one of the more common complaints.
Staal said:
Starke said:
This gets into your comment about complaining about not having a romantic partner in Dragon Age 2 who is the same race as your protagonist... except, that's not true, there is one. Isabella. Because, skin color is incidental in DA2, for the game's context, the interracial relationship is with Merril or Fenris, because they're elves, and Hawke is human.
People still experience the game with their real life identity as a yardstick. It is exactly the same as saying a gay guy is not allowed to request a gay option in a game where there was none. For example, I saw on the Witcher 2 forum that someone asked whether a gay option would ever be included. Would it be ok to label him as a bigot? People identify with what they are themselves. That goes equally for skin/eye/hair colour, sexual orientation, religion, place of birth, shoe size etc. You cannot say one group can ask for their inclusion but another cannot. That is the hypocritical bigotry that I have just about enough of.
The Witcher is a bit of a different case though. Geralt is a literary character (using the term loosely), and the Witcher games are licensed games. There is already a canonical Geralt, who, while promiscuous, isn't bisexual. What's more, Geralt is a genetically engineered albino... saying you identify with him wouldn't be that far off saying you identify yourself with 47 from the Hitman games (if 47 actually had a personality).
If you actually want to attack CD Projekt (or, for that matter, IO Interactive) for being bigots, or at least misogynistic, you've probably got a lot of fuel to do it.
As to everything else? Fereldans are pretty consistently established as being Dragon Age's equivalent of Scottish so unless you're actually from Scottish ancestry, saying, it needs to match my identity doesn't quite work. The fact is, when it comes to RPGs, players assume an external role and take on an identity that, by definition, is not their own.
What's more excluding groups is a major chunk of what's going on. Even within the context of 12th century Europe, which DA is drawing on, there are a number of cultures that are conspicuously absent. And, while you can say it's unfortunate that you can't play exactly who you want to be, I'd point at my GF, who can't even play her own gender in the Witcher games, and say, she might have a stronger argument to make.
Staal said:
Starke said:
Where DA2 (and for that matter, Dragon Age Origins) talk about race and religion is through the use of fantasy races, the Qunari, the Elves, and the Dwarves, instead of through our preconceived notions of what race is or isn't.
This is what I mean. Previous comment you say "skin colour is incidental". I don't agree but I am happy to accept it for arguments sake. But that leads us to the following... If skin colour in the game has no meaning because it is represented by Elves are you saying that it would be alright that all human characters in the game are white? And that if anyone complains about it they are bigots?
No, or at least not exactly. Dragon Age actually has a pretty heavy focus on bigotry, both racially, religiously, and economically (or politically, I'm not 100% sure which was intended). It's actually deliberately an element of the setting. Humans are racist against the Elves, Dwarves exploit each other along class and caste lines, and Templars are bigots when dealing with the Mages.
In this sense, skin color is incidental, that is to say, it's not an element of the racism going on in the setting. The setting wants to talk about racism, but feels the need to filter it through a different context. It wants to talk about religious oppression, but feels it can't do that without creating an artificial system to partially justify it.
Within that context, the player is presented with Isabela as a human love interest, rather than, "oh, we need to offer a Caucasian looking love interest."
Staal said:
You can't butter your bread on both sides.
You actually can, and it's delicious. Easiest way is melt the butter in a pan, sop the bread in it and eat it while it's still warm.
I do know what you mean, though.