OOTS #959 - The Discussion Thread

[Socksy]

If you don't want modern politics in fantasy comics, then just imagine how horrible it is for women (and gay people, and so on) to have their REAL oppression portrayed in almost every piece of fantasy fiction EVER.
Sexism IS POLITICAL, and as such, it shouldn't be in fantasy comics, if fantasy comics are to not contain real-life political topics.

I'd prefer no sexism at all in comics, because, you know, I want to actually HAVE FUN when I read comics. Not be reminded of the bad things in my real life, you know?

But as things are, I'm grateful if a fantasy author at least realizes that he made mistakes in the past and that bikini armour is stupid.

Are you saying all women are oppressed? In fact, are you even saying women in the earlier strips are oppressed (for being women rather than for being, say, a low-level commoner)? If you're oppressed, then I feel sorry for you, but no, it's not that big of a problem, at least not in first-world countries.

Plus, have we EVER seen a character in bikini armour? Haley had leather armour showing her midriff. Leather armour. It's MEANT to have a low AC bonus on it compared to other stuff. There aren't any female characters in medium or heavy armour which shows off... well, ANYTHING, are there (in this series)?

EDIT: @Jaycemonde, I think they were referring to V being a transsexual, not Bandana

[DaggerPen]

I'm just gonna take these in order.


Obviously. What else would ex mean? Ex-captain? Ex-patriate?

Actually, no. There was a guard who was gay like four hundred strips ago, and that's only that we know about.

You're supposed to put two s's in there, bub. Besides, if Bandanna were a trans woman, she'd still be gay. Not magically straight. She says she's a woman, she's a woman. Bing bang boom. Conversely, if Bandanna were a cross-dressing man, Bandanna wouldn't be using female pronouns.

gg, no re.

+1 to this.

When it comes to tallying up queer representation in-comic, I go back and forth on whether to include Haley. We get references to her latent bisexuality and her having kissed girls, but we don't really see much of it outside the few occasional references, but since she's in a committed relationship how much could we see? As a bisexual woman, I'm leery of writing off a bisexual character for being in a committed relationship with a man, but a casual "Haley's latent bisexuality" and a cryptogram reference to kissing some girls isn't a whole lot as making Haley's bisexuality clear goes. She doesn't need to scream it from the rooftops, but if it's something you can easily miss during a first time readthrough it's somewhat lacking. So yeah.

(Also, I believe Haleo and Julelan reveals a long-running gag character as gay, but until that's revealed in-strip it's another wobbly case.)

[JSSheridan]

Thanks Giant!

Though I will not be buying an OotS doll.

[snafu]

If we are doing action figures, can I put in a pre-order for a Darth V?

[Rodin]

Plus, have we EVER seen a character in bikini armour? Haley had leather armour showing her midriff. Leather armour. It's MEANT to have a low AC bonus on it compared to other stuff. There aren't any female characters in medium or heavy armour which shows off... well, ANYTHING, are there (in this series)?

Sabine goes into combat in a bikini. Then again, she is a literal incarnation of illicit sex. We're lucky she's wearing that much.

Everybody else tends to dress pretty appropriately.

[Storm_Of_Snow]

First OOTS homosexual characters until we find out V's gender.

And Inkyrius' as well.

Actually, aside from the Haleo and Julelan reference, the Prison Guard in Cliffport (strip #387) and possibly Haley, there's also been the two Sapphire Guard paladins from the additional strips around New Year in War and XPs.

So no, Bandana's not the first - and not even the first to appear in the on-line version.

[Khay]

Bonus points for having Haley specify "for rogue-types like us" just to make it even clearer this isn't an example of that "women in positions of authority are naturally a poor fit" trope. I also loved those cheesy action figures. Resistance Leader Haley Starshine™ looks seriously badass in the new art style.

I feel I should mention that War and XPs has two female paladins who are dating each other. It starts out as an excuse in 313a (to get out of having to eat dinner with Miko - they claim to be a new couple and to really need some alone time) but they seem to have decided to just roll with it in 314a. Only one of them gets a name, Yunji. Miko of all people says "May the Twelve Gods bless your union", and V "fail[s] to see anything out of the ordinary", so that's nice to see, too. Though they're still throwaway characters who only show up in bonus strips.

[Jaycemonde]

EDIT: @Jaycemonde, I think they were referring to V being a transsexual, not Bandana

Either way, being transsexual doesn't magically make you gay or not based on whatever your "starting point" was.

I feel I should mention that War and XPs has two female paladins who are dating each other. It starts out as an excuse in 313a (to get out of having to eat dinner with Miko - they claim to be a new couple and really need some alone time) but they seem to have decided to just roll with it in 314a. Only one of them gets a name, Yunji. Miko of all people says "May the Twelve Gods bless your union", and V "fail[s] to see anything out of the ordinary", so that's nice to see, too. Though they're still throwaway characters who only show up in bonus strips.

Spoiler: This turned into a ramblerant, but it's not negative.

Show

Yeah, The Giant has always come off as incorporating his LGBTA+ characters in the Right Way--in other words, they exist, no excess attention is drawn to them (which might, as a matter of fact, be why people are only just noticing) and in general nobody makes a big deal about it in the comic. It's like the way Gearbox pulled it off in Borderlands 2. Axton (playable character) off-handedly remarks that he spends all his money on "guns and ladies...and sometimes dudes." Sir Hammerlock mentions he has an old boyfriend who hunted stalkers. Moxxi specifically flirts with Maya. Gaige flirts with Maya too, actually. Hell, it's even implied that the Big Bad of the game is bi, based on things that some of the male civilians say. And the Eastern European-sounding tourist lady asking if Moxxi's said anything about her. Then you've got the gay doctor explaining that she can't experiment on the two gay guys in the Evil Laboratory because one of them has the skull-shivers (not that that stops Handsome Jack from forcing her to do it anyway). Hell, even when it comes to gender, that game did things rite. The guards refer to you as Sir-slash-Ma'am, several people mention how completely irrelevant sex is, and the only thing that could really be taken as transphobic (and this is very borderline) is a quip by Handsome Jack (the Big Bad, as previously stated) that he doesn't know whether to refer to someone as a lady or not because she has a huge scar that, as he puts it, makes her look like she "headbutted a belt sander". The Giant is doing fine, honestly.

[t209]

You're supposed to put two s's in there, bub. Besides, if Bandanna were a trans woman, she'd still be gay. Not magically straight. She says she's a woman, she's a woman. Bing bang boom. Conversely, if Bandanna were a cross-dressing man, Bandanna wouldn't be using female pronouns.

I mean her "ex" might be either a transexual or a cross dressing man.
I think the latter might be an idea from WoW RP servers.

[Coidzor]

I'm not sure if there's a story here or if magic armor is just that much more common and cheaper in the OotS universe that it would be the sort of thing to just leave in a lover's closet in the first place...

Well, OK, there's probably a story here so it's more if there's a story here or there's a story here and it's more ubiquitous than I recall it being implied to be before.

I mean her "ex" might be either a transexual or a cross dressing man.
I think the latter might be an idea from WoW RP servers.

"She was curvy," would preclude the crossdressing man idea.

And considering the setting and the sex changing magics already demonstrated, transsexuality probably isn't all that relevant here for filling out armor for a curvy woman. Not running around in magic armor, anyway. It would have even less to do with Bandana's sexual orientation.

[Jaycemonde]

I mean her "ex" might be either a transexual or a cross dressing man.
I think the latter might be an idea from WoW RP servers.

Well, being trans is still completely irrelevant to whether someone is gay or not. In fact, I'd say it's even more irrelevant now that I know you're talking about someone who isn't even in the strip.

And...cross-dressing guys are an idea from WoW? How does that even work?

[Jaxzan Proditor]

In regards to the title of today's strip, I gotta say, I never meta commentary I didn't like.

*clap clap clap*

OK, I'm seeing a lot of commentary here about there being 'forced' dialogue in the strip, and I gotta say after re-reading it and re-reading it some more, I just don't see it.

Anywhere.

The only thing that looks even slightly forced is Haley talking about giving leadership advice to Bandana semi-out of the blue. But you know what? I read that has Haley being a Presumptuous PC. That is, not too long ago (for her, at any rate), she went through an experience as being a leader of a party and she hated it. But since she's seen the ropes, she figured she could tell the 'newbie' (who, of course, isn't a newbie at all) what to look out for.

In other words, she's got a good case of Roy Disease (he really can be the poster child of Presumptuous PC in the party at times).

That it then (sorta) blew up in her face as the NPC told her, "Nah, it's all good" is even MORE Roy like, IMO.

So, yeah, just not seeing it at all. At most, it is showing a bit more of a character facet with Haley. That is, the character facet of Haley caring more about people around her and not just herself (and her immediate family).

Darn it Porthos, quit ninjaing me!

Im with you, I hated it when they were all "free the slaves!". Modern day morality just doesn't fit at all in this hardcore fantasy world, with its magic and swords and coffee machines.

You win this thread.


Anyways, to talk about the strip itself, I loved it. I love how Rich seems to be apologizing for his past portrayals of some characters in the comic, I love how Haley assumes that Rogues naturally aren't good at leadership, only to have Bandana claim that she loves it. I love the little detail about how Bandana's ex was curvy (hinting pretty much only one thing), and finally I love the action figures. Thank you, Mr. Burlew.

[Xzeno]

As someone who has been particularly critical of OotS's portrayal of gender in the past, in contrast to a fairly solid take on race, I just wanted to drop by to give a curt nod of approval while keeping my arms crossed over my chest.

*nods curtly with approval*

[Kalmageddon]

Yes, of course the point of her mentioning that she had an ex-girlfriend is so that you know she is gay. That is part of how including gay people in your comic happens, short of me showing her having sex with another woman. I already waited 38 strips from her first appearance to mention it. How many more strips do I need to wait before including LGBT representation in the comic? 100? 200? How subtle do I have to be to make you, personally, comfortable? This is the first comic that explores Bandana as a character, so this is when it shows up. The alternative is deliberately keeping her "in the closet" to satisfy some arbitrary standard of "narrative smoothness." Not acceptable.

If it seems awkward to you…oh well. Sometimes, correcting a past mistake is awkward. Sometimes, in order to move forward, we have to stop waiting for the moment to be right, or the situation to arise organically, or whatever euphemism you want to put on the idea of maintaining the status quo because it's easier, and just do it. If it's "forced" now, that's only because I failed to include any obviously gay characters for 900+ strips and that is so completely uncool that I need to fix it NOW, not later. If that produces some rough edges, well, I guess we'll all just have to put on our adult pants and learn to live with that one solitary flaw in this otherwise pristine work of art* for the sake of inclusion.



No. Stories exist primarily for the purpose of delivering messages to one another, whether about human nature, or the world around us, or what have you. They are how humans have communicated life lessons since the dawn of language, and probably before. Whether or not that is why you read them, that is definitely why people write them. If the story is incapable of delivering the message that the author is trying to send about how they see the world, then that is a failure of the story, and the story needs to change. The author should not leave out his or her message so as not to disrupt the delicate story. That's the cart leading the horse.

*This is sarcastic. No one quote me saying that I think OOTS is a pristine work of art. It is not.

Between this and some of your previous statements, I have to ask: is there something inherently wrong with escapism? By being entratained by a story that might give you something emotionally while not being directly tied to real life issues?

[Trurl]

again: Have we seen her ex? I would suppose we haven't, given that Bandana has probably spent most of her time on board, and I cannot think of anyone referring to past extensive airship travel.

[The Giant]

Between this and some of your previous statements, I have to ask: is there something inherently wrong with escapism? By being entratained by a story that might give you something emotionally while not being directly tied to real life issues?

If a story gives you something emotionally, then it probably is tied to a real-life issue—the issue of how we process our emotions while making our way through the complex world in which we live. Not all messages need to be externally focused.

If a story fails to even give you that much, then it's porn. Or fanfiction. Or both, probably. Either way, I have no time for it.

[Coidzor]

again: Have we seen her ex? I would suppose we haven't, given that Bandana has probably spent most of her time on board, and I cannot think of anyone referring to past extensive airship travel.

Probably not. While the ex may have been a member of the crew at one point, as presented, it is quite unlikely that the ex is still a member of the crew.

Between this and some of your previous statements, I have to ask: is there something inherently wrong with escapism? By being entratained by a story that might give you something emotionally while not being directly tied to real life issues?

Depends, partially, upon what one is escaping into/from and why, no?

[oppyu]

Woot, very happy with this strip. We have a gay character, we have development for the gay character, we have two women getting together to have a friendly talk about plot relevant and character beat stuff, we have a lampshade/joke/casual 'I see what I did there and it wasn't great, my bad' on topics like midriff!Haley and slutshaming!Haley, and we get a comment thread which is sure to be interesting until it's inevitably locked. Good times.

[Lissou]

Between this and some of your previous statements, I have to ask: is there something inherently wrong with escapism? By being entertained by a story that might give you something emotionally while not being directly tied to real life issues?

I can't answer for anyone but myself. But it seems to me we draw emotions from real-life comparison. We relate with the characters because of the way they are similar to us or people we know. Including gay characters in the comic means that more readers have someone to relate to, among other things.

I can't think of any instance of a piece of art that drew a strong emotional reaction from me that wasn't linked to the way it would have affected me or people I know had it happened in real life.

Yes, we can project our feelings onto people who don't match up. I can relate with a male character, for instance. But I would notice and feel excluded if there were absolutely no female characters whatsoever. It would feel weird. It would take me out of it. If it wasn't explained somehow, it would seem to be weak storytelling. I can see how the same could be said for LGBT characters. For all we know, many of the characters were LGBT, but it wasn't stated clearly and as a result they were invisible, while we have plenty of examples of opposite-sex relationships. This might just be a small detail to some people (as I said, I didn't pay much attention to it to begin with) but for some people it might make the whole story easier to feel emotions about because suddenly it's more real, and all the emotions they can experience in real life can be channeled through the story.

I definitely know I enjoy the story immensely more due to the female characters being varied and relevant to the story. I don't see why it shouldn't be the same for other aspects as well.

[Ron Miel]

If it's "forced" now, that's only because I failed to include any obviously gay characters for 900+ strips and that is so completely uncool that I need to fix it NOW, not later.

Apart from Elan's experiments at band camp, and Nale's experiments with Sabine's shapeshifting, and Haley kissing a girl (more than) once, and her latent bisexuality persona, and the Cliffport cop, and Phil the lawyer, and plausibly V, and maybe Belkar's ambiguous attraction to V, that is.

[pikeamus]

That's just the most voluminous resource. Don't recommend that site, or it's statistics. They're woefully inaccurate. The Ghostbusters analysis alone, and the fact they never updated it (or, to the best of my knowledge, any of their ratings), illustrates that.

It's still the best resource available for making claims about the frequency with which films pass or fail. I agree that the numbers deserve whacking great error bars, but it is at least an indicator that saying "most fail" is unsupported and the reverse (most pass) is weakly supported.

Ratings are updated, it's happened on a number of films I've discussed on the site. It's not very consistent though, as to whether or not it happens. Whether any given film passes or fails is rather subjective anyway, witness the disagreement in the discussion thread over The Winter Soldier as an example, which makes it even worse, but that's unavoidable really.

[oppyu]

I was going to do a point-by-point rebuttal, but it seems kind of pointless when you're challenging the author on whether or not any of his characters have been obviously gay. Word of God doesn't win everytime, but I think it'd win here.

[Wizzardman2]

Thanks, Giant!

Excellent as always.

[The Giant]

Apart from Elan's experiments at band camp, and Nale's experiments with Sabine's shapeshifting, and Haley kissing a girl (more than) once, and her latent bisexuality persona, and the Cliffport cop, and Phil the lawyer, and plausibly V, and maybe Belkar's ambiguous attraction to V, that is.

All of that falls under either "non-obvious" or "non-characters," or both.

[CoffeeIncluded]

Seriously? This is controversial? I think it's a welcome change and a nice way to publicly declare what he's been more-privately acknowledging in various threads on the subject for the past few months. Go back and read some of the really early comics and you'll notice all the cheap shots and gags at Haley and her sexuality, or jokes about girls in general (see the trap searching wardrobe malfunction, or that gag with the orbs). A few are ok, and some are funny, but there are just so many. And while there are gags referring to men, there aren't nearly as many and those are more character based (for example, Elan's "Woo! I'm naked! You can't see me!" gag is more because he's an idiot than anything else). I'm happy to see the Giant acknowledge that this is not okay.

As for Bandana being gay, this was my reaction: "Huh? Oh, neat. Carry on." And I didn't even notice the mixed-race thing. This kind of thing shouldn't matter, and yet apparently it does, which makes talking about it even more important. Because there are gay and other non-cisgendered non-heterosexual people in real life, and this should be the same in DnD. This was explicitly acknowledged in the 5e rules (finally!), and heck I'm playing a gay mixed-race character right now. It really shouldn't be so unusual. And frankly I thought the casual admission was perfectly fine--I think we just expect there to be a bit of lead up or trepidation in our world, which again says a lot about our world.

Finally, about the offensively charged comments, sadly girls do that. I feel bad about this but I've slut-shamed one girl I really really can't stand (I try to justify it to myself by saying that she deserves the epithet by sleeping with a different guy every week, more importantly mocking me for not doing the same which is another example of offensively-charged comments, and most importantly considering sleeping with a guy more important than getting a blind drunk girl she called a friend alone in a fraternity home safely). And while I justify it to myself that's no excuse. I shouldn't have called her a slut and I shouldn't call her a slut anymore. And I'm not going to.

[Hoshi_no_senshi]

Im with you, I hated it when they were all "free the slaves!". Modern day morality just doesn't fit at all in this hardcore fantasy world, with its magic and swords and coffee machines.

Actually I had to read this sort of comments to understand what the point about modern politics was about. I was a bit surprised of knowing that Bandana's ex was a she, but not too much, it is in the statistics of the large number of characters in this strip. And I see very little "politics" in this, there is no reference to specific legal rights they claim, and I suspect there are very little legal rights in a pirate's relationship.

In my view this is just building up elments of a character's backstory. Now we know that Bandana is single, is gay (or bisexual), and is sympathetic with Haley. This could open several plot lines, character weakness and points of strength, possible plans to solve difficult situations.... And of course comic situations (difficult, due to the sensitivity to those themes of several people around, but still possible).

Exactly, to make some comparisons, when we knew about Julio's incredible charisma with women. Or fondness of Blackwing for baubles. Or a cat appeared on Lord Shojo lap.

[Benthesquid]

Actually I had to read this sort of comments to understand what the point about modern politics was about. I was a bit surprised of knowing that Bandana's ex was a she, but not too much, it is in the statistics of the large number of characters in this strip. And I see very little "politics" in this, there is no reference to specific legal rights they claim, and I suspect there are very little legal rights in a pirate's relationship.

On a tangent, this makes me wonder if the Mechane has a Pirate's Code they follow. I mean, probably to some degree (to sort out division of spoils and all), but I wonder how detailed it would be.

[Anarion]

Huh, this is not what I was expecting the discussion to be about. I was planning to just pop in and make a snide comment about how Haley is spending WAY too much time with Elan, but the action figure thing should happen anyway.

[The Troubadour]

I can't answer for anyone but myself. But it seems to me we draw emotions from real-life comparison. We relate with the characters because of the way they are similar to us or people we know.

Or people we would like to be - even when we actually wouldn't like to be them in the real world.
Mind you, the Giant's definition of the purpose of storytelling is still too simplistic, but in this regard, it makes sense.

Out of curiosity, to what OotS characters, specifically, can the last two panels refer? As of this moment, I can only think of Haley and Crystal.

If you're oppressed, then I feel sorry for you, but no, it's not that big of a problem, at least not in first-world countries.

Sexism is very insidious, it takes many forms, not just the obvious ones. Consider how often a woman had nude pictures of her leaked out by an ex-boyfriend, and was then treated like the person in the wrong in that situation - as if the crime there was that a woman allowed nude pictures of herself to be taken, instead of the massive violation of trust and privacy on the part of her ex. That's just one example of the myriad ways in which sexism works, and it's only one of the most obvious ones.

[ratfox]

I'm remembering right now two instances in my memories of a woman in a majorly-male group trashing another woman because of how she dressed… And also a girl I knew claiming that two girls cannot ever be really friends, because of competition for boyfriends.

But now that I think of it, those are fairly isolated events we should not construe as a general rule…