Well for starters, the issue with the gay romances talked about in "The Old Republic Online" are not just a matter of saying that gay people exist, but to actively portray relationships between them, with the player put into the role of one of the participants in that relationship. Even if you do not pursue it, you doubtlessly, in true Bioware fashion, have to deal with the homosexual interest pining after your character constantly to give you the option to pursue it if you choose to pick it up at a later time.
Like it or not, there IS a differance in degree. What's more, like it or not, homosexuals of either flavor are a pretty tiny minority of people, demanding representation in everything given the actual numbers or claiming "neglect of this huge group" isn't paticularly fair or accurate.
My overall attitudes about homosexuality aside (I'm sure there are some messages archived far back in the forums if your paticularly interested), one has to understand that Star Wars has been increasingly directed at children. Jar Jar Binks, The Ewoks, various Cartoons, there is no way around that, Star Wars fans constantly complain about it. We're not talking young teens, but pre-sexual children which is something else entirely.
Unless Bioware actually intends to hire a group of people to engage in draconian enforcement of the game's ratings by hunting down and banning kids based on age, then I don't think this is a good idea. A "T" rating means nothing if the rating isn't going to be enforced, and overall I don't think I've ever seen an MMO enforce ratings before as even ones with an "M" rating have plenty of people opently claiming to be below the allowed age, as well as massive changes on the active server populations cooresponding to the US school schedule. Arguably this kind of neglect is exactly why we had cases about ratings and how seriously they are taken brought before The Supreme Court.
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As far as Feminism goes, it's a political movement that has long since outlived it's usefulness, it's largely based around power in trying to keep people organized into voting blocks by keeping long dead issues alive. Just like racial battles, this one is long over, it's about fitting into society and taking advantage of the oppertunities presented. With feminists it's now gone from "we should have the right to vote, own property, and hold jobs" to things like "well, special rules should be made so employers can't take actual gender differances into account". This involving things like lowering the physical entrance requirements into jobs, ignoring pregnancies officially while making special allowances for them, and other assorted things. Right now women are not prevented from doing jobs assuming they meet the requirements, some women do, but the ones that don't oftentimes use feminism as a rallying cry to say that men have loaded the deck when really, the requirements exist for a reason. Police Officers for example have to run so fast, jump so high, and be able to lift/carry so much for very good reasons, cops have a hard time with those requirements, and lowering them for women just means more less effective cops on the force. A female officer that can't defend herself, chase a suspect, or help carry/handle a bound suspect safely is
a liability, if she CAN do those things it's not a problem, but when you lower the standards you hurt everyone. That's just one example I bring up because it's been a paticular battleground due to the authority of the police, and one that continues despite there being plenty of women in Law Enforcement (some of which honestly don't belong there, having benefitted from lowered requirements, but that's another story). The point here is that Feminism (the pursuit of empowerment and increased dominance of women in society) is by no means a positive thing. People who complain about it,typically have their reasons. Where once Feminism was a good thing, that time is past, and as time goes on the undeniable benefits and victories of that movement become further in the past, most of what feminists are accomplishing or pushing for are increasingly dubious... while there are exceptions to every rule, the negative perception has not come about for no reason.
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When it comes to the point about physical ideals in video games and other fantasy media, you (Moviebob) do make a fair point here at least, and one I've pointed out myself.
A point to consider here though is that this kind of advertising has existed in the mainstream for a long period of time. I mean, there are plenty of romances, dramas, chick flicks and other things that have featured sexed up portrayals of the male lead. Guys like Richard Gere, Tom Cruise, and others have made a career out of it. This is to say nothing of that old ad with that "Lucky" guy drinking a Diet Pepsi (I think that was his stage name), I beleive he even wound up in bit parts on shows like "Wings" that were popular at the time because he had become such a male sex icon.
The problem isn't that we have these beefy guys in posters it's that bugging people, it's that it's tacky and attached to a third or fourth rate product that has someone managed to catapult into a major success by being in the right place at the right time.
People knocking Twilight is more a reflection of the franchise, than the style of promotion, which is why this is getting attention where other ad campaigns haven't. It's sort of like how even guys will inflict some major "lulz" on the sex symbols attached to crappy products. The differance between say Lara Croft and any one of a jillion other sexy female protaganists, many of which were made fun of, is that Lara was from a series of games that was pretty bloody good originally, and manages to hold on just enough to earn a lot of second chances. The same can be said of say "Soul Calibur" or "Dead Or Alive" and their female cast (and let's be honest, those games provide plenty of male cheesecake as well, with lots of beefy men walking around in outlandish outfits or bare chested... men have got Cammy and Chun Li, Lei Fang and Helena, women have Ken and Vega, Bayman and Ryu, and others. It's just we don't bother think about guys like Guile walking around with biceps bigger than their head since people pay more attention to the female models, without really looking at the full picture and how certain other characters seem to be being received).
The point here is that Twilight is not getting crap for using Cheesecake in it's avertising, or that men are not used to guys being presented sexually for the benefit of women, we see it all the time, so much that we're blind to it. The problem with Twilight is that it's really bad cheesecake, attached to a crap product, that people can't get away from. It's like the equivilent of the video game "Cat Fight"... which was another all female fighter (for the PC) that went nowhere, because despite all pretensions hot female characters can't carry a game that isn't good to begin with (they can just extend a franchise). "Twilight" and it's marketing is like if somehow that game had become a smash sensation due to timing instead, and was omni-present, and you couldn't get away from it.
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As far as the whole "My Little Pony" thing goes, your probably right. Sadly I doubt they will take the banned "Strawberry Shortcake" and more recent "Rainbow Bright" ideas from Penny Arcade as actual pitches for televised relaunches.
