I just don't get it... It is a joke and a pretty tame one for L5R standards. Chuda Ruri was post girls for these kind of jokes, and I remember people joking about some Fabio type Crane Artisan... Pillow Fights sound rather tame...

20 minutes ago, Yandia said:

I just don't get it... It is a joke and a pretty tame one for L5R standards. Chuda Ruri was post girls for these kind of jokes, and I remember people joking about some Fabio type Crane Artisan... Pillow Fights sound rather tame...

"We've had worse incidents of sexism and objectification in the past" is really not as good of a counter as you might think . . .

3 minutes ago, Kinzen said:

"We've had worse incidents of sexism and objectification in the past" is really not as good of a counter as you might think . . .

I don't really think that of those incidences have anything to do with sexism... I also don't think that pillow fights are sexist either.

It honestly baffles me how a person being sexy is confused with sexism.

Next we have an uproar because Rokugan is not diverse enough and needs less Japanese influences...

28 minutes ago, Yandia said:

I just don't get it... It is a joke and a pretty tame one for L5R standards. Chuda Ruri was post girls for these kind of jokes, and I remember people joking about some Fabio type Crane Artisan... Pillow Fights sound rather tame...

It's not just that the joke was a little crass, it is additionally the context it which it was made.

Hoturi is one of the more significant characters in the story. His relationship to Kachiko an important part of not only his story and hers but important to the plot of the game as a whole. In changing that character it threatens the memory and significance of that relationship to both those characters. Then to make a joke that belittles the significance of that change is just showing how little respect the new story team seems to have for the old one and its fans.

10 minutes ago, Yandia said:

It honestly baffles me how a person being sexy is confused with sexism.

The good news is, the answer to that question is quite easy to find, if you look. Google phrases like "male gaze" and "female objectification;" those will get you started.

It's only an incident at all because it has been made into one. There was no malicious intent or suppressive ideology directed at anyone by the comment made.

If someone personally though the comment was unwarranted due to the circumstances it was made under then they should have privately contacted the company and aired their grievances. The entire argument that the comment was unprofessional coming from anyone, who, in turn isn't any more professional about it is ironic. If I don't think one of my co-workers is acting professionally I go to my superior and report it to them, I don't scream it across the entire building. If I visit an establishment and someone acts unprofessionally, then I contact a manager/supervisor and report the behavior, I don't spray paint my grievance on their walls.

This forum doesn't seem to be an appropriate spot to make any real change happen if you feel some injustice is happening in the world. Perhaps change.org might be a better website to try and make headway on your topic, I for one think this conversation ruins these forums.

Point of order : we're not talking about a person being sexy ; a fictional character is not a person .

Or, as a famous French artist once put it : Ceci n'est pas une personne.

20 minutes ago, Kinzen said:

The good news is, the answer to that question is quite easy to find, if you look. Google phrases like "male gaze" and "female objectification;" those will get you started.

Those are viewpoints propagated by sexists.

Female gaze and male objectification work identical... Please pick up a female romance novel or watch the the music video " Carly Rae Jepsen - Call Me Maybe".

People find other people sexy and will objectify/idealize each other. That is human nature and nothing of that is bad.

10 hours ago, Fumi said:

I can understand FFG having an employee that made a mistake, too. What bothers me is how they tried to sweep the whole thing under the rug. That was absolutely the worst way to handle this.

Just thought it was worth noting since this sweeping under the rug point comes up a few times that the original post was also posted on a FFG facebook page by the thread starter and responded to by FFG.

Facebook Response

" Thank you for your message, John. The joke made was inappropriate, which is why we immediately posted an edit and an apology. The original post was deleted, as you note, though this was not done at our request. We were not attempting to sweep anything under the rug. We firmly support inclusiveness and openness within our community, and we do apologize to anyone who was offended."

If you take their word maybe attention can go to the reddit mods rather the FFG regarding who deleted the posts. FFG edit and clarification of the original response should of closed this issue after the unacceptable first response was made.

26 minutes ago, Silverfox13 said:

It's only an incident at all because it has been made into one. There was no malicious intent or suppressive ideology directed at anyone by the comment made.

If someone personally though the comment was unwarranted due to the circumstances it was made under then they should have privately contacted the company and aired their grievances. The entire argument that the comment was unprofessional coming from anyone, who, in turn isn't any more professional about it is ironic. If I don't think one of my co-workers is acting professionally I go to my superior and report it to them, I don't scream it across the entire building. If I visit an establishment and someone acts unprofessionally, then I contact a manager/supervisor and report the behavior, I don't spray paint my grievance on their walls.

This forum doesn't seem to be an appropriate spot to make any real change happen if you feel some injustice is happening in the world. Perhaps change.org might be a better website to try and make headway on your topic, I for one think this conversation ruins these forums.

Wow. A reasonable point of view being presented in this kind of thread?

I am stunned.

And yeah, going around and giving sentences malicious intent is like, many a sad person's hobby. It is both unfortunate to see it in this community, and to see it going to 4 pages already - when we ALL know this goes around in circles and achieves no purpose at all other than people becoming angry at one another.

It was a light hearted joke. Chill, relax, try being a little tolerant.

Yandia, I don,t know why you liked my post, because it really wasn't on your side - it was a reply to your nonsensical statement that "a person being sexy is being confused with sexism".

Chuda Ruri (for example) is not a person being sexy ; it's a (male) artist deciding to picture a representation of a woman in a position that draws attention to her sex appeal. These are not the same things.

20 hours ago, muzouka said:

Had a crazy thought that would likely never happen: What if a Scorpion wanted to troll the Crane and decided to use pillows when challenged in a duel?

I think the Scorpion's idea of a pillow fight is a ninja smothering his sleeping victim with a pillow.

I could definatly see that on a card.

1 hour ago, Yandia said:

Those are viewpoints propagated by sexists.

Oookay. That is a nice red flag that our conversation will not go anywhere useful -- so thanks for that, I guess?

36 minutes ago, Himoto said:

Yandia, I don,t know why you liked my post, because it really wasn't on your side - it was a reply to your nonsensical statement that "a person being sexy is being confused with sexism".

Chuda Ruri (for example) is not a person being sexy ; it's a (male) artist deciding to picture a representation of a woman in a position that draws attention to her sex appeal. These are not the same things.

Well, yes and I agree with you... It was not even a person who was objectified. We are taking about a literal object; a trading card to be exact.

I was talking in a border sense, which I obviously didn't make clear enough. So my statement looks out of place or nonsensical in your words, I get that. Perhaps "sexy things or pictures", would have been the better phrase in this context.

What I find problematic in the modern discourse of sexism is that non-issues like a joke about two fictional women pillow-fighting are blown out of proportions.

If the bar is so low that these things are labeled sexist, the term becomes meaningless. If an imaginary pillow fight is sexism, then sexism is not so bad, and that is a dangerous thought which gets normalized by this kind of behavior.

Actual sexism - discrimination and prejudice based on sex - destroys the life of actual people and has nothing to do with this. I mean this is really not funny, when you had to deal with that in real life.

22 minutes ago, Kinzen said:

Oookay. That is a nice red flag that our conversation will not go anywhere useful -- so thanks for that, I guess?

I am open for dialog, but to be quite frank. When people tell me that only men objectify women and not the other way around. I really don't know what to say other then that sound really sexist to me.

Women want sex, men want sex. And yes women look at men and objectify them... When people are to focused to much on one sex this is usually a very good indicator that they at least have sexist tendencies.

If women were as pure as you think I think human species went existence by now.

She isn't talking about women being pure, she is talking about the fact that media have been dominated by products made by males, for males, and objectifying women is seen as an innocent standard. Which in turn often leads to forcing women character into a restrictive set of tropes that define their figures. Kind of like it's ok to include an obese male hero in the main cast of a show, but no one will allow you to write an obese female character who isn't episodic/for comedy.

1 minute ago, WHW said:

She isn't talking about women being pure, she is talking about the fact that media have been dominated by products made by males, for males, and objectifying women is seen as an innocent standard. Which in turn often leads to forcing women character into a restrictive set of tropes that define their figures. Kind of like it's ok to include an obese male hero in the main cast of a show, but no one will allow you to write an obese female character who isn't episodic/for comedy.

Hmmm... I remember watching Rosanne when I was young and when I remember correctly she was obese, wasn't she? Long time ago I think her size varied a lot from season to season. Also I think you sell women accomplishment short (for males by males). That almost sounds like females get nothing done in society which I am not sure is a world view I want to subscribe to.

And yes I agree on the tropes. They are very much genre dependent, but also very gender dependent. And good authors can challenge these dependencies, play with them subvert them. I mean we can laugh about a man being punched or kicked in the balls... I am not even sure how you could make that work. Harm to females is usually something we as society don't laugh at. Well, but I am not a good author...

Here's the entire gist of the joke:

Q:"Would you take a bribe to make a card that would objectify female characters?"

A: "Hah, it wouldn't require a bribe. I'd also like to objectify those characters"

The reason we're not just shrugging it off is because it goes to the heart of what the people making the jokes value in those characters. When men objectify women, there is an implication and a threat to women who actually play the game: "this space is for men, when you play this game, you are entering a space made by and for men." That's not an inclusive space. It manifests itself in men assuming that the woman across from them at the table aren't good or are only playing because their boyfriend brought them along and trying to mansplain the game to their opponent (often as they are losing the game to the very woman they are 'explaining' the game to). The community of long-time L5R players I play with don't put up with that nor should we.

I always thought the community was better than this. I can't believe the rage over a quip. Its a character in a story, a character that uses her own methods to further her goals. You do not have to like her. You are not forced to sympathize with her. You don't have to say "I want to be just like her". There are many other men and women you can put your weight behind that do fit the standards you desire in a character.

I wonder how much hate mail GRRM gets because of the things that happen to the characters in his books. Just like in Westeros, the politics of Rokugan are not equal to the politics of our world. Lighten up people and enjoy the game.

2 minutes ago, C2K said:

I always thought the community was better than this. I can't believe the rage over a quip. Its a character in a story, a character that uses her own methods to further her goals. You do not have to like her. You are not forced to sympathize with her. You don't have to say "I want to be just like her". There are many other men and women you can put your weight behind that do fit the standards you desire in a character.

I wonder how much hate mail GRRM gets because of the things that happen to the characters in his books. Just like in Westeros, the politics of Rokugan are not equal to the politics of our world. Lighten up people and enjoy the game.

I haven't really made up my mind yet myself as to how big a deal I think it is, but I would like to point out that the rage in question is about a question asked and an answer given in questionable taste. While characters were involved, it had nothing to do with how the characters are or will be officially presented in the story. I'm sorry, but your argument doesn't really seem to address the topic being discussed at all.

37 minutes ago, A_to_the_C said:

Here's the entire gist of the joke:

Q:"Would you take a bribe to make a card that would objectify female characters?"

A: "Hah, it wouldn't require a bribe. I'd also like to objectify those characters"

The reason we're not just shrugging it off is because it goes to the heart of what the people making the jokes value in those characters. When men objectify women, there is an implication and a threat to women who actually play the game: "this space is for men, when you play this game, you are entering a space made by and for men." That's not an inclusive space. It manifests itself in men assuming that the woman across from them at the table aren't good or are only playing because their boyfriend brought them along and trying to mansplain the game to their opponent (often as they are losing the game to the very woman they are 'explaining' the game to). The community of long-time L5R players I play with don't put up with that nor should we.

Here's the thing though, in the later remarks we know that was not the answers intent and the intent was corrected in an edited post. So it should instead be listed as such.

Q:"Would you take a bribe to make a card that might objectify these female characters?/Look at this 'silly' idea (not really silly as it is easily misconstrued)

A: "Ha, not going to happen." (Badly written and easily misunderstood as a sexist remark)

The problem was the fact it was a quick written reply, instead of dashing the question aside, they accidentally seemed to verify that it was going to be a thing. When I first saw that I tried to imagine what they meant by saying "No bribe needed" (paraphrasing) as such I imagined the crane blocking a sneak attack (knife being utilized against her) with the nearest object, a pillow. It seemed an interesting idea, and the only feasible way for their to be a 'pillow fight' in the setting of Rokugan as I know it. The other major issue here is that instead of posting a straight apology (I believe they did apologize) they deleted the topic, of course this was done to keep it from spiraling out of control as both sides would tear each other apart. Having that happen at a press conference would be very bad for business of course.

Sure, it was just one question . . .

. . . and one ill-advised answer . . .

. . . and a whole pack of guys popping out of the woodwork to say it's no big deal . . .

. . . and somebody in this thread saying the real sexists are the women who complain about putting up with this b.s. . . .

. . . and a pile of proof that "just one question" is a symptom of a bigger problem, which is being demonstrated in abundance here.

I've poured enough of my energy down this particular pit for the time being. I'm done.

24 minutes ago, C2K said:

I always thought the community was better than this.

You don't find many better qualities than a critical eye and a moral backbone. Those are top tier virtues IMO.

I just hope that I get to play Kinzen and not some of the others on this thread.