Ground Zeroes Rape Apologists Baffle Me

[Pogilrup]

gargantual and Lupine

That's a lot like many other stories that came before this one.

By themselves, there is no problem with tales that contain events that lead to a tragic, virtually meaningless death of a female character.

However, taken together and they form a trend where predominant number of female characters are killed off just to motivate or test the will of a male protagonist.

This game is unfortunately yet another entry in that big list of works that use the Disposable Woman trope.

There are also a lot of stories where a lot of male characters are killed off just to motivate/test the will of male protagonists, but nobody cares about those guys. As far as I can tell, Metal Gear has had more sympathetic male characters get killed off to motivate/test the hero than females.

Male characters get roughly equal screen time as both victim and protectors.

Female characters portrayed as victims still outnumber the portrayals as protectors.

 

[gargantual]

gargantual and Lupine

That's a lot like many other stories that came before this one.

By themselves, there is no problem with tales that contain events that lead to a tragic, virtually meaningless death of a female character.

However, taken together and they form a trend where predominant number of female characters are killed off just to motivate or test the will of a male protagonist.

This game is unfortunately yet another entry in that big list of works that use the Disposable Woman trope.

Yeah ask yourself but should it have been Chico instead, literally unwriting and re-writing the events of MGS Peace Walker making him the traitor to MSF and conflicting personality to be tortured by skullface wheras Paz would not as likely to go to the camp to attempt to save him, and all just for the sake of not appearing like it's marginalizing young women?

See where this is heading? The story appears to be too far written to merely judge these turn of events through the lens of gender politics ramifications.

As opposed to B-Horror, where 'again' its relatively easy for many women characters used as villain-bait to exercise the minimal amount of intelligence to avoid danger and not end up as a blatantly obvious sex sacrifice.

When two bombs are deeply inserted into any characters nethers, what could any of them really do to save themselves?

 

[Pogilrup]

gargantual and Lupine

That's a lot like many other stories that came before this one.

By themselves, there is no problem with tales that contain events that lead to a tragic, virtually meaningless death of a female character.

However, taken together and they form a trend where predominant number of female characters are killed off just to motivate or test the will of a male protagonist.

This game is unfortunately yet another entry in that big list of works that use the Disposable Woman trope.

Yeah ask yourself but should it have been Chico instead, literally unwriting and re-writing the events of MGS Peace Walker making him the traitor to MSF and conflicting personality to be tortured by skullface wheras Paz would not as likely to go to the camp to attempt to save him, and all just for the sake of not appearing like it's marginalizing young women?

See where this is heading? The story appears to be too far written to merely judge these turn of events through the lens of gender politics ramifications.

As opposed to B-Horror, where 'again' its relatively easy for many women characters used as villain-bait to exercise the minimal amount of intelligence to avoid danger and not end up as a blatantly obvious sex sacrifice.

When two bombs are deeply inserted into any characters nethers, what could any of them really do to save themselves?

I cannot change the canon, only Kojima can.

But what I can personally do is realize the shortcomings of this work and hope that others would do so as well. Of course, video game fans are notorious for refusing to accept the possibility of a work having flaws in the areas of gender representation.

 

[gargantual]

gargantual and Lupine

That's a lot like many other stories that came before this one.

By themselves, there is no problem with tales that contain events that lead to a tragic, virtually meaningless death of a female character.

However, taken together and they form a trend where predominant number of female characters are killed off just to motivate or test the will of a male protagonist.

This game is unfortunately yet another entry in that big list of works that use the Disposable Woman trope.

Yeah ask yourself but should it have been Chico instead, literally unwriting and re-writing the events of MGS Peace Walker making him the traitor to MSF and conflicting personality to be tortured by skullface wheras Paz would not as likely to go to the camp to attempt to save him, and all just for the sake of not appearing like it's marginalizing young women?

See where this is heading? The story appears to be too far written to merely judge these turn of events through the lens of gender politics ramifications.

As opposed to B-Horror, where 'again' its relatively easy for many women characters used as villain-bait to exercise the minimal amount of intelligence to avoid danger and not end up as a blatantly obvious sex sacrifice.

When two bombs are deeply inserted into any characters nethers, what could any of them really do to save themselves?

I cannot change the canon, only Kojima can.

But what I can personally do is realize the shortcomings of this work and hope that others would do so as well. Of course, video game fans are notorious for refusing to accept the possibility of a work having flaws in the areas of gender representation.

Not saying its without its flaws but its more glaring ones are how the loaded 'guantanamo prison abuse tone of Ground Zeroes, contrasts against the campy silly depiction of Peace Walker, wheras earlier games in the series managed to be dramatic whilst switching back and forth between campy and serious in the same game. That's a weakness that can objectively be noticed.

Paz's death while players certainly notice, as you've seen from the thread don't objectively treat it as a failure. To you representation matters more, to others the story matters more. So they see it as unfortunate loss of a character, than 'the destruction of a straw woman'.

I didn't like token black characters getting knocked off in older action films, but its like Morgan Freeman dying in the movie 'Red' I don't have the energy or see the need to cry racist, because his character didn't even come into the story with a winning deck or a full bill of health to begin with.

Give someone a objectively big fighting chance, and rob it away without explanation, and THEN there's a cause for 'writer bias'. Personally, I didn't see Kojima doing that.

 

[Lupine]

gargantual and Lupine

That's a lot like many other stories that came before this one.

By themselves, there is no problem with tales that contain events that lead to a tragic, virtually meaningless death of a female character.

However, taken together and they form a trend where predominant number of female characters are killed off just to motivate or test the will of a male protagonist.

This game is unfortunately yet another entry in that big list of works that use the Disposable Woman trope.

There are also a lot of stories where a lot of male characters are killed off just to motivate/test the will of male protagonists, but nobody cares about those guys. As far as I can tell, Metal Gear has had more sympathetic male characters get killed off to motivate/test the hero than females.

Well I can agree with the part about this being like stories that have come before. That is sort of where the concept of things being cliche comes from, except by the same token there are things that can be accepted as universal truths in literature or at the very least they don't require much exposition for the audience to understand as motivations.

As humans there are certain societal norms that reach across culture or time period, and so for the sake of expedience I'll call them universal truths even if they aren't universal in the personal but they tend to be so at least generally speaking. So, universal truth. People love their families. People are protective of their homes. People don't like their way of life forcefully changed against their will. Stories tend to be made of conflict. If you're breaking down things to their smallest and perhaps truest parts, most things are the same or at the very least similar. All of that is to ask the question, does it really matter that it is the same as other stories? If it did, archetypes wouldn't be such a part of the literary process I think. However as has already been pointed out, Metal Gear does this quite a bit, it plays on simplistic action tropes, sometimes straight sometimes subverted, but the tropes tend to mean less than the emotions experienced during the journey.

I'm not saying that Paz's death wasn't playing on the fridge trope or that her treatment isn't an example of kicking the puppy to show that the villain is really evil, however I am arguing that your assertion is wrong that these things together some how combines to make women disposable. If anything I'd point out that in most fiction and action fiction to say the least that people are disposable. Life is cheap. I remember reading this quote from Stephen King and as a writer myself I feel that it is probably the truest thing a man might have said about the art: ?Kill your darlings, kill your darlings, even when it breaks your egocentric little scribbler?s heart, kill your darlings."

As a writer it isn't about how you are attached to the characters, it isn't about how your cultural or religious leanings subconsciously touch your decisions as you write, more and more or at least if you are trying to be a good writer at any rate it comes down to what in your opinion is best for the story. However at the end of the day, it is your opinion. There might be better writers that see something you don't, there might be options that you don't realize you have because of your upbringing and personal experiences, but in the end it is your opinion that matters as the author of a particular work.

I'm not saying that no one has the right to question your decisions or discuss them, not by half. If you're a writer and you can't take criticism you might as well quit, but what I am saying is that something to you that seems like glaring misrepresentation or simulated woman abuse, might simply have never even occurred to Kojima. In fact I'm pretty sure it didn't, especially with the music at the time of Paz's death. I feel like for him this was Paz's big moment, she hadn't gotten to make a whole lot of choices in her life and suddenly she makes the one that decides the fate of the series. She was murdered sure, but she was also a martyr and a hero.

That's the thing about writing though, you don't get to pick what people see or don't see in your work. You just get to bare the little piece of yourself that you would and see what happens.

 

[gargantual]

gargantual and Lupine

That's a lot like many other stories that came before this one.

By themselves, there is no problem with tales that contain events that lead to a tragic, virtually meaningless death of a female character.

However, taken together and they form a trend where predominant number of female characters are killed off just to motivate or test the will of a male protagonist.

This game is unfortunately yet another entry in that big list of works that use the Disposable Woman trope.

There are also a lot of stories where a lot of male characters are killed off just to motivate/test the will of male protagonists, but nobody cares about those guys. As far as I can tell, Metal Gear has had more sympathetic male characters get killed off to motivate/test the hero than females.

Well I can agree with the part about this being like stories that have come before. That is sort of where the concept of things being cliche comes from, except by the same token there are things that can be accepted as universal truths in literature or at the very least they don't require much exposition for the audience to understand as motivations.

As humans there are certain societal norms that reach across culture or time period, and so for the sake of expedience I'll call them universal truths even if they aren't universal in the personal but they tend to be so at least generally speaking. So, universal truth. People love their families. People are protective of their homes. People don't like their way of life forcefully changed against their will. Stories tend to be made of conflict. If you're breaking down things to their smallest and perhaps truest parts, most things are the same or at the very least similar. All of that is to ask the question, does it really matter that it is the same as other stories? If it did, archetypes wouldn't be such a part of the literary process I think. However as has already been pointed out, Metal Gear does this quite a bit, it plays on simplistic action tropes, sometimes straight sometimes subverted, but the tropes tend to mean less than the emotions experienced during the journey.

I'm not saying that Paz's death wasn't playing on the fridge trope or that her treatment isn't an example of kicking the puppy to show that the villain is really evil, however I am arguing that your assertion is wrong that these things together some how combines to make women disposable. If anything I'd point out that in most fiction and action fiction to say the least that people are disposable. Life is cheap. I remember reading this quote from Stephen King and as a writer myself I feel that it is probably the truest thing a man might have said about the art: ?Kill your darlings, kill your darlings, even when it breaks your egocentric little scribbler?s heart, kill your darlings."

As a writer it isn't about how you are attached to the characters, it isn't about how your cultural or religious leanings subconsciously touch your decisions as you write, more and more or at least if you are trying to be a good writer at any rate it comes down to what in your opinion is best for the story. However at the end of the day, it is your opinion. There might be better writers that see something you don't, there might be options that you don't realize you have because of your upbringing and personal experiences, but in the end it is your opinion that matters as the author of a particular work.

I'm not saying that no one has the right to question your decisions or discuss them, not by half. If you're a writer and you can't take criticism you might as well quit, but what I am saying is that something to you that seems like glaring misrepresentation or simulated woman abuse, might simply have never even occurred to Kojima. In fact I'm pretty sure it didn't, especially with the music at the time of Paz's death. I feel like for him this was Paz's big moment, she hadn't gotten to make a whole lot of choices in her life and suddenly she makes the one that decides the fate of the series. She was murdered sure, but she was also a martyr and a hero.

That's the thing about writing though, you don't get to pick what people see or don't see in your work. You just get to bare the little piece of yourself that you would and see what happens.

Bravisimo! Bravisimo! Man that's what I've been trying to say. She saved Snake's/Miller's and Chico's lives for what they were worth, and lets not forget Snake's offspring is merely a pawn and viral death carrier on a short lifespan. These are all vessels made to be used stretched, changed, and done whatever with for the sake of the story's impact.

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

Even in Peace Walker, Paz was at least 20-ish. I forget why but she was pretending to be 16 for some reason or another. Not planning on talking about the difference between how someone looks and their actual age but Paz has never been "underage" in any game in the series.

I'm just going to have to call you on this though not necessarily because what your saying is wrong but the problem with this mentality. The problem, you see, is that telling me someone is a certain age and then showing me someone who appears to be substantially younger is a problem. You don't arrive at that aesthetic by accident - it was carefully crafted to look exactly like that. And what it looks like is a girl who I'd bet money is a few years shy of 18 at best.

This same nonsense plays out regularly in video games. The Asari in Mass Effect aren't female according to the game and yet every single one of them appears to be built more or less like a human female between 20 and 35 years old. They're also all voiced like females and the most notable one in the series dresses and acts in a sterotypically feminine way throughout the series. Tera pulls the same thing with the Elin who are allegedly hundreds of years old and yet look exactly like a pre-teen girl.

The claim being made falls entirely flat in each of these cases because other than the minor aside explaining that Paz is of legal age or the Elin are actually ancient or the Asari are mono-gendered and therefore not at all a race of girls all these games do is provide lots of information that directly contradicts those claims. The problem here isn't with what's being depicted in the slightest but rather that the people involved seem to realize what they depict might seem wrong if you don't offer a hurried and insubstantial explanation. When you see just a consistent and half-assed attempt to claim that your duck is not a duck all it tells me is that they know it's a duck and they seem to be ashamed of their directorial choices.

This isn't to say that I have a problem with Paz or the Asari or even the (fairly creepy, honestly) Elin but rather that if developers are so very uncomfortable about the design choices they make then, perhaps, they ought to reexamine their designs. It's either that or just own it. Dancing around the issues of sexuality and violence (which are largely the problem at the heart of all of this) undermines anything they might hope to achieve leaving little but titillation without substance.

 

[Zhukov]

The Asari in Mass Effect aren't female according to the game and yet every single one of them appears to be built more or less like a human female between 20 and 35 years old. They're also all voiced like females and the most notable one in the series dresses and acts in a sterotypically feminine way throughout the series.

Except Asari are female. Both in the lore and in the presentation.

They're mono-gendered, not genderless. And that mono-gender is female, since all Asari can potentially get pregnant. The codex thingy even outright describes them as "all female".

Of course, the reason for them being all-female is less "hey wouldn't this be a cool idea of an alien species" and more "let's give the lonely nerds a race of blue alien babes who swing both ways".

 

[Smeatza]

Except Asari are female. Both in the lore and in the presentation.

That's debateable.
They carry children and have breasts but does that make them female?
Do merely human concepts of gender even apply to a one gender species? I don't think so.

In fact I remember a sequence in the first game where it's speculated that Asari make themselves appear visually more similar and more appealing to species interacting with them, using their psychic powers.
Perhaps the player's perception of the Asari is coloured by Shepherd's perception, which is coloured by the Asari's psychic powers.

They're mono-gendered, not genderless. And that mono-gender is female, since all Asari can potentially get pregnant. The codex thingy even outright describes them as "all female".

No gender and all the same gender is effectively the same thing.
Look at bacteria, they can reproduce and share genetic material. But we don't call them female because of that, we call them genderless. If a species does not have two sexually dimorphic genders then our human concepts of male and female simply don't really apply.
Perhaps in the context of the Mass Effect world the codex was written by humans, who are also subject to simplistic views of gender.

Of course, the reason for them being all-female is less "hey wouldn't this be a cool idea of an alien species" and more "let's give the lonely nerds a race of blue alien babes who swing both ways".

That's a very cynical view. I would have expected the design, lore and characterisation of the race to be more exploitative and pandering if they were created purely for sexual appeal.
If I had to hazard a guess (which is what we're doing, guessing) I would say they thought to themselves,
"How do we make a race dominant yet benevolent and have that as a key part of their design?...... I know, a motherly theme."

I don't know, maybe it's just semantics. But I don't think it's fair to define the Asari on such conventional terms.

 

[Lupine]

Of course, the reason for them being all-female is less "hey wouldn't this be a cool idea of an alien species" and more "let's give the lonely nerds a race of blue alien babes who swing both ways".

That's a very cynical view. I would have expected the design, lore and characterisation of the race to be more exploitative and pandering if they were created purely for sexual appeal.
If I had to hazard a guess (which is what we're doing, guessing) I would say they thought to themselves,
"How do we make a race dominant yet benevolent and have that as a key part of their design?...... I know, a motherly theme."

I don't know, maybe it's just semantics. But I don't think it's fair to define the Asari on such conventional terms.

I don't know, I just always figured they were an homage to the Vorlon race from Babylon 5. That is to say that they are a species that no one is sure of their true form because every other race perceives them differently based on the alterations in their genetic code. That is not to say that they match up perfectly, but I definitely thought...homage and that they went with women instead of angels.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HVSlKqOXf2k

 

[Zhukov]

Except Asari are female. Both in the lore and in the presentation.

That's debateable.
They carry children and have breasts but does that make them female?
Do merely human concepts of gender even apply to a one gender species? I don't think so.

In fact I remember a sequence in the first game where it's speculated that Asari make themselves appear visually more similar and more appealing to species interacting with them, using their psychic powers.
Perhaps the player's perception of the Asari is coloured by Shepherd's perception, which is coloured by the Asari's psychic powers.

That scene is in the second game and they weren't being serious. The developers were just poking fun at the fact that Asari basically look like blue humans.

They're mono-gendered, not genderless. And that mono-gender is female, since all Asari can potentially get pregnant. The codex thingy even outright describes them as "all female".

No gender and all the same gender is effectively the same thing.
Look at bacteria, they can reproduce and share genetic material. But we don't call them female because of that, we call them genderless. If a species does not have two sexually dimorphic genders then our human concepts of male and female simply don't really apply.
Perhaps in the context of the Mass Effect world the codex was written by humans, who are also subject to simplistic views of gender.

I bet if bacteria had boobs and hips, spoke in feminine voices and gave birth then we'd call them female.

Of course, the reason for them being all-female is less "hey wouldn't this be a cool idea of an alien species" and more "let's give the lonely nerds a race of blue alien babes who swing both ways".

That's a very cynical view. I would have expected the design, lore and characterisation of the race to be more exploitative and pandering if they were created purely for sexual appeal.
If I had to hazard a guess (which is what we're doing, guessing) I would say they thought to themselves,
"How do we make a race dominant yet benevolent and have that as a key part of their design?...... I know, a motherly theme."

I don't know, I just always figured they were an homage to the Vorlon race from Babylon 5. That is to say that they are a species that no one is sure of their true form because every other race perceives them differently based on the alterations in their genetic code. That is not to say that they match up perfectly, but I definitely thought...homage and that they went with women instead of angels.

Well, they weren't created purely for sexual appeal. They obviously wanted Asari characters to be able to be taken seriously as well. And there's clearly some homage to the old green-skinned alien space babes of cheesy sci-fi.

However, I don't know how anyone can look at the whole able-to-fuck-any-species-and-in-fact-are-culturally-encouraged-to-do-so thing without having their cynicism alarm go crazy.

Look, asari are a race of sexy blue alien babes whose declared objective is to mate with males and females of other species. Do we really need to fool ourselves into trying to pretend they're a good, serious race with other objectives than sexyness - especially when the developers themselves in some interview have openly declared they designed asari with the word "sexy" in mind?

Yeah, the Asari always bugged me a bit for that reason. Damn near everything about them seems to have been made up to justify the omnisexuality thing.

I love the individual Asari characters, but the race as a whole... meh.

 

[Vegosiux]

Yeah, the Asari always bugged me a bit for that reason. Damn near everything about them seems to have been made up to justify the omnisexuality thing.

I love the individual Asari characters, but the race as a whole... meh.

"It's a big galaxy, so it's not a stretch that such a species would exist." Now of course, I agree with you on "cynicism alert" and while yes, the Asari weren't created "purely" for sex-appeal, I'd dare say they were created primarily for it, and that's only marginally less bad when it comes to writing. I mean, sure, they at least tried to write some substance around the core of "let's go with sexed-up blue space babes", but, honestly, just having started there kind of makes the point moot...

 

[Terminal Blue]

And there's clearly some homage to the old green-skinned alien space babes of cheesy sci-fi.

Honestly, that's how I always took them. They are basically an updated version of the Syreen from Star Control (who fly around in dildo shaped ships seducing enemy crew). Mass Effect 1 was actually really retro in its aesthetic, although that got eroded in Mass Effect 2.

But I still think what came out is kind of funny.

What's actually weird about them though is not so much why they look like women by why they act like women. They're for the most part an entire civilization of various stereotypical female characters, which is somewhat odd.

 

[Zhukov]

Look, asari are a race of sexy blue alien babes whose declared objective is to mate with males and females of other species. Do we really need to fool ourselves into trying to pretend they're a good, serious race with other objectives than sexyness - especially when the developers themselves in some interview have openly declared they designed asari with the word "sexy" in mind?

Yeah, the Asari always bugged me a bit for that reason. Damn near everything about them seems to have been made up to justify the omnisexuality thing.

I love the individual Asari characters, but the race as a whole... meh.

And it would have been so easy to keep the concept of asari as sexy alien ladies while at the same time not making them as laughable as they are.
I mean, all the ants and bees that we see are female. It would've been easy to keep the concept of an alien race of all females without making it utterly ridiculous like a cheap porn flick.

But then again, that's not what the developers wanted because Mass Effect has awful writing. I don't care what the fans say: I find Mass Effect's writing to be abysmal.
You don't notice it because in the little things - dialogues with NPC, some substories and characters - it works well. But then you realize how the grand scheme of things has worse writing than a generic fps game.

Okay then.

While I am by no means blind to the faults of the series, if you're looking for a ME hate-off then you're talking to the wrong person.

 

[Smeatza]

That scene is in the second game and they weren't being serious. The developers were just poking fun at the fact that Asari basically look like blue humans.

Yeah I don't think so, if that was what they were trying to do then they failed miserably and should employ somebody else to do all of their "poking fun."

I bet if bacteria had boobs and hips, spoke in feminine voices and gave birth then we'd call them female.

Even if we did that doesn't mean we would be right to do so.

Well, they weren't created purely for sexual appeal. They obviously wanted Asari characters to be able to be taken seriously as well. And there's clearly some homage to the old green-skinned alien space babes of cheesy sci-fi.

So when you said "the reason," you meant "a reason."
It makes quite the difference.

However, I don't know how anyone can look at the whole able-to-fuck-any-species-and-in-fact-are-culturally-encouraged-to-do-so thing without having their cynicism alarm go crazy.

Meh, nature has come up with just as weird models of reproduction.
Perhaps it's because I think more of, have more faith in people in general.
Perhaps it's because I'm less judgemental of/sensitive to, this perceived sexual element.
Perhaps it's just because I'm less of a cynic.
But even the green alien babe element doesn't seem out of place to me.

 

[Zhukov]

That scene is in the second game and they weren't being serious. The developers were just poking fun at the fact that Asari basically look like blue humans.

Yeah I don't think so, if that was what they were trying to do then they failed miserably and should employ somebody else to do all of their "poking fun."

Here's a video the scene in question:

Spoiler

Whether you find it funny or not is up to you. But if you can't tell that it was intended to be humorous, then, well, apparently you and me come from different planets.

Well, they weren't created purely for sexual appeal. They obviously wanted Asari characters to be able to be taken seriously as well. And there's clearly some homage to the old green-skinned alien space babes of cheesy sci-fi.

So when you said "the reason," you meant "a reason."
It makes quite the difference.

No, I meant "the main reason, but not the only reason".

Yes, it makes a difference, but not much of one.

However, I don't know how anyone can look at the whole able-to-fuck-any-species-and-in-fact-are-culturally-encouraged-to-do-so thing without having their cynicism alarm go crazy.

Meh, nature has come up with just as weird models of reproduction.

Sure.

And the weird model of reproduction that showed up in the nerdy space adventure about MrMcAwesome The Mighty Manly Space Captain and his Loyal Crew of Hotties just so happened to be one involving a species of bisexual blue aliens that can have sex with humans and resemble hot human women.

But clearly I'm just a mean ol' cynic who never learned the true meaning of Christmas.

 

[Smeatza]

Here's a video the scene in question:

Spoiler

Whether you find it funny or not is up to you. But if you can't tell that it was intended to be humorous, then, well, apparently you and me come from different planets.

I never doubted it was humorous, what I do doubt is that the humor is comes from where you say it does.
They are not poking fun at how much they look like humans, if anything they are poking fun at the idea that they look like humans.
In actual fact the humor comes from drunk people saying silly things, nothing more.
And even so, there's no reason the tone of the scene should automatically exclude it from the canon.

No, I meant "the main reason, but not the only reason".

Yes, it makes a difference, but not much of one.

I could argue that but it would be pointless semantics.

Sure.

Kangaroos have two vagina's so they can keep a reserve fetus on ice and quickly replace their baby if it dies.
That just springs to mind, I could remind myself of much weirder.

And the weird model of reproduction that showed up in the nerdy space adventure about MrMcAwesome The Mighty Manly Space Captain and his Loyal Crew of Hotties just so happened to be one involving a species of bisexual blue aliens that can have sex with humans and resemble hot human women.

Oh I doubt it's a coincidence. Not that it matters.

But clearly I'm just a mean ol' cynic who never learned the true meaning of Christmas.

No not mean, grumpy, pessimistic, hot-headed maybe. After all you are over-exaggerating the sexual element of the Asari and seem highly judgemental of such an element existing at all.