Queer IF

[mostly_useless]

I thought that was more to do with under-bridge space availability than politics.

[Squinky]

@Tale

Let’s form a gender-neutral punk band called “Aggressively Androgynous”. Who’s in?

I’ll be the tuba player.

[Tanga]

@maga

In effect it offers a fantasy where queer becomes meaningless, where being queer will make no difference to your experience

Which is not necessarily a bad thing, all the time. (It’s a bad thing if it’s the only thing that exists.) The newsgroup discussion in 1997, bear in mind, started because someone argued that gay people in fiction were beyond normalisation - that you literally couldn’t put a gay character in a game without making homosexuality a central theme of the story. It wasn’t a hugely convincing argument in 1997, but it wasn’t demonstrably false; that it’s demonstrably false now is, I think, a step forward not to be dismissed.

Isn’t that argument how ‘The Lost Spellmaker’ came about? Perhaps it’s in the in game ‘about’ since it’s not on the site, but I’m pretty sure the writer created this game with the intention of proving that games with homosexual protagonists need not be political. I think he succeeds admirably.

[maga (Sam Kabo Ashwell)]

@Tanga

@maga

In effect it offers a fantasy where queer becomes meaningless, where being queer will make no difference to your experience

Which is not necessarily a bad thing, all the time. (It’s a bad thing if it’s the only thing that exists.) The newsgroup discussion in 1997, bear in mind, started because someone argued that gay people in fiction were beyond normalisation - that you literally couldn’t put a gay character in a game without making homosexuality a central theme of the story. It wasn’t a hugely convincing argument in 1997, but it wasn’t demonstrably false; that it’s demonstrably false now is, I think, a step forward not to be dismissed.

Isn’t that argument how ‘The Lost Spellmaker’ came about? Perhaps it’s in the in game ‘about’ since it’s not on the site, but I’m pretty sure the writer created this game with the intention of proving that games with homosexual protagonists need not be political. I think he succeeds admirably.

It coincided with the argument. I think that the author denied that it was a direct response to it, but it was before my time.

[jdyer]

I should point out that the Choice of Games work SLAMMED! (about professional wrestling) lets you play a gay person with a straight public persona or vice versa.

[Peter_Piers1 (Peter Piers)]

Now THAT’s very interesting. The necessity of duplicity for fear that the public might reject the gay artist.