OOTS #1068 - The Discussion Thread

[Mido]

Not sure if this will help the current overarching discussion about sexism parallels in the comic but I'll give it a whirl.

First, I can't find it for now, but a good example of this sort of thing comes in the form of the backstory of the stock barbarian character in the Pathfinder handbook. Can't remember her name but I barely recall that she has sort of a similar situation. Male dominated society, absurdly strong female character sent on a suicide mission she succeeds in, survives, finds out before she returns that she was sent to die in that mission and leaves her tribe to adventure... Hopefully if anybody here has a copy of that can proof read if I got all the important plot details correctly.

Second, prose, even in a brief manner, might just be a good place to put in parallels to things that cause problems in RL. Kinda like how comedy sometimes pokes fun at the flawed things that happen in RL as well. Good comedians poke fun at that and make the audience think, thereby facilitating a non-hostile way of instilling a conflicting idea over somebody's bias barrier.

Third... well, I don't really have a third. I just wish I could put a link on that first point. I really think that would be a good parallel. I guess my real third is that, acting up against injustice is fine and all, but is it economical? People aren't just symbols against oppression, inequality and injustice, they're just people too. Much like I don't expect Uncle Myrtok or Aarindarius to just drop everything and help the Order wholeheartedly if the Order were to ask for it because they're basically people with nuanced motivations and not just cardboard cutout deus ex machina's, It's also not that easy to just rise up against these injustices because situations and truth are always just very nuanced. RL gets in the way, families to feed, lives to get back to and all that.

edit:
Also, I'd like to assert that lady frost giant is not in fact whining but possibly expressing self confirming righteous indignation because if we were to buy in to the premise that she is under workplace bias duress, this is a great chance for her to succeed at her job with very little to no conflicting point to prove otherwise since the only other voice that can make assertions on what happened is dead... Unless her bosses comes back with the whole "maybe her partner softened them up for her" schtick though. Damn.