Gendered Clothing Items in Armageddon

[Vox]

X-D +1

Describing something as masculine or feminine in Zalanthas doesn't necessarily mean what it does in the real world. Leave it up to players to utilize that descriptor how they like since there are still men and women in the game of all races, and masculine/feminine means varying things to each Zalanthan-race anyway.

That said, I'd love to see more racial descriptors in clothing that insinuate an item was designed with a certain physicality in mind perhaps even make it unwearable by other races based on natural shape and design.. it could only be sized to someone with the appropriate racial flag. (Giving us some much needed half-giant only wearable gear)

[cnemus]

Like many things in Arm, I think it comes down to individuals. I do not think there should be a cultural expectation that defines feminine and masculine 'behavior' as relating to gender, but there would be male and female individuals that wish to behave and look a certain way for their own concept. I see these words as meaning shaped like a woman or shaped like a man, with no cultural significance beyond that.

Use the clothes you want, don't pull words that some people enjoy just because you don't. Leave them in.

We aren't speaking english in game, we are speaking something else. We use english to convey understanding to each other.

[tapas]

I too am amazed by the number of armchair anthropologists who actually ignore the last five decades of research on this topic.

[valeria]

I see these words as meaning shaped like a woman or shaped like a man, with no cultural significance beyond that.

The thread started with shoes, though. Feet are shaped like feet.

Though I think wearing the slaughtered corpses of your male or female enemies on your feet would be very Zalanthan.

[BadSkeelz]

I see these words as meaning shaped like a woman or shaped like a man, with no cultural significance beyond that.

The thread started with shoes, though. Feet are shaped like feet.

Though I think wearing the slaughtered corpses of your male or female enemies on your feet would be very Zalanthan.

Are there actually any footwear items in the game that have names like "a woman's slipper" or "feminine boots"? Cause those just sound like lazy writing to me.

[sleepyhead]

Yeah there are 'feminine' and 'masculine' shoes. It is lazy writing, but most people are lazy readers so I enjoy giving them a quick idea of my character's style even if they just skim over his/her clothing.

[Hauwke]

The only time I have ever seen the words feminine and masculine used in a description, is the Mdesc, which is very different from the Sdesc.

[valeria]

Yes, these totally exist Skeelz. Right in the sdesc, even. You have to click on the code area to expand it but I bolder the sdesc so maybe they'll show up better.

Code Select Expand

Dyed skin and linen form this pair of soft, feminine shoes.  Raptor skin
covers the entire toe area, sewn so the seam is not only visible but also a
decoration along the top of the foot.  Linen stretches taut along the sides
of the foot.  An inch wide strip of leather-backed skin supports the
wearer's heel.  The raptor skin covering the toes and heels is connected
with soft black linen using tiny stitches that are virtually invisible. 
You assess [b]a feminine pair of black raptor-skin shoes.[/b]..
...it is primarily made of cloth.
...can be worn on one's feet.


Code Select Expand

Heavy leather sewn to close over the top of the foot, comes to a sharp
point at the toe, and has the slightest suggestion of an upward curve.
Black sandcloth hides the leather, and makes this shoe more fashionable.
Stopping at the shinbone, the shoes offer ankle support without rising as
high as boots. 
You assess [b]a masculine pair of black shoes[/b]...
...it is primarily made of leather.
...can be worn on one's feet.

Edit: or it won't let me bold them, bah

[Bebop]

The masculine shoe in question to me is a pointy, black shoe.  There is zero percent anything inherently masculine about it even by OOC gender norms.  All of these arguments about... an item being made for a certain build make no sense.  It's a shoe, people.  A shoe has nothing to do with body type.

I feel like this thread is kind of proving my point that people associate feminine items with daintiness.  The feminine shoe in question uses the word soft
many a'time.  Softness is not an attribute Zalanthans would be applying to women.  That's OOC gender norms rearing their head.

If the genders are socially equal, there would be no need to identify clothing (aka fashion which is largely a social statement) by gender IMO.

Also men and women don't necessarily have different body types IG.  Like a female dwarf is gonna look pretty similar to a male dwarf.  Many elves gonna look androgynous.  See what I'm saying here?

As people are justifying it I'm seeing some underlying gender bias come through here.  I think it would be far better a practice to describe the item as it is and let the players decide if their male, female or non-binary character would like to wear the item in question without the sdesc tilting the perception of the item.

I just don't think it's thematic.  I'm gonna rest my case, because as I said I don't want to kick a hornets nest.  Food for thought.
I will leave you with the definition of feminine.

Feminine
1. having qualities or appearance traditionally associated with women, especially delicacy and prettiness.

[Cendell]

I did notice that a lot of gendered items were...smoothed over, some time in the last couple of years. Jerkins, breastplates, a few things that were clearly just described that way for convenience sake (Likely by submission, or Mastercraft for some specific goal in the distant past) So I don't think there's anything wrong with changing things to make something more precisely described.

[Akariel]

Ah, seems we missed some when we went over the DB a couple years back.

Terms like 'masculine' and 'feminine' are not okay for descriptors in objects because objects should show what they are, not tell. You can make an object as masculine or feminine as you desire, but it should be done through descriptive word use rather than finite terms that don't have a traditional backing in Zalanthas. For example, instead of 'feminine', you can add a phrase to the main description of an object that says something about how the midsection is belted to make the waist flare out.

[Harmless]

mastercraft the badass boots you want. I agree, feminine and masculine are a little jarring to read, and I have seen those items too and went, 'huh,' when reading them. I don't think I ever once bought those items. I'll 'typo' them in the future and apparently staff are onboard with fixing em up. That's cool.

I don't care if there's some relics of the 90's past in some ancient database items. I'm more interested in players continuing to pump out mastercrafts to get the fashion edge on everyone else.

[Bebop]

Ah, seems we missed some when we went over the DB a couple years back.

Terms like 'masculine' and 'feminine' are not okay for descriptors in objects because objects should show what they are, not tell. You can make an object as masculine or feminine as you desire, but it should be done through descriptive word use rather than finite terms that don't have a traditional backing in Zalanthas. For example, instead of 'feminine', you can add a phrase to the main description of an object that says something about how the midsection is belted to make the waist flare out.

This makes complete sense to me.

[Heade]

In a world where both genders are completely equal, the terms "feminine" or "masculine" as descriptors could absolutely still apply. They'd just use the definitions sans the gender associations. Behold:

Feminine: Delicate-looking, dainty, pretty, cute.
Masculine: Stout-looking, rugged, strong, utilitarian.

Men in Zalanthas can absolutely wear feminine items and women can wear masculine items. They're useful words for describing the synonyms above, though I personally would probably just use a synonym similar to what I described above were I designing such an item. In any case, we play a text-based game. Let's not further limit our vocabulary.