Too Many Women in Magic Lore?
Lore forum
Posted on Sept. 6, 2017, 11:31 a.m. by vbfabled
I would like to preface this by saying that I am starting this thread here because I trust this community to keep this a mature and civil exchange of ideas rather than allowing it to descend into an emotionally overcharged mess of ad hominem slinging chaos. To avoid misunderstandings, I ask that you read the entire post before responding. Please do your part.
Lately I have noticed that basically every "hero" introduced in the past several sets, especially the more successful/helpful ones, have been women. From Tazri to Samut to Hazoret to Pia, we've had a noticeable lack of testosterone among our heroes lately. And after seeing some of the new Ixalan spoilers, I have a hard time believing it's a coincidence.
Okay, but is that a problem? Not necessarily. I like strong female characters as much as the next guy, Samus Aran has been my favorite video game character since I was five, Elspeth is still a favorite planeswalker of mine. So why am I making this post? Well, here's the thing, WotC is a business, and businesses don't do anything without a reason. After some consideration, I figure the most likely motive here is that WotC is trying to expand their player base.
It's no secret that the vast majority of MtG players are guys, and in an age where "nerdy" interests are becoming more and more socially acceptable, it makes sense to try to expand your customer base into a group previously less included.
Now this is all fine and good, too. I've met a lot of awesome women who play magic. To me here, the issue is the risk of alienating a portion of the existing community in the efforts to expand it. See, people grow attached to characters they can relate to, and people relate to character who have things in common with them, and it's much easier to relate to characters of the same gender. This is becoming a problem for me, because I haven't had a character introduced that I can really relate to since Khans block, leading me to become less engaged in the story, which was one of the things that hooked me into magic in the first place. I've reached the point that new spoilers don't even really excite me anymore because I know the only cool new characters won't be ones that I can relate to.
So basically, while I think it is beneficial to have strong female characters and to expand the MtG community, I wish wizards would not forget about the existing players who came for the game and stayed for the characters.
Thoughts?
Jimmy_Chinchila says... #2
I once debated someone about pronouns used for Eldrazi Titans, with someone insisting I should use "she" instead of "it" for Emrakul (Emrakul, the Aeons Torn). It's a fricking alien monster that spawns offspring. We don't assign gender to rocks or microbes. If it doesn't reproduce sexually it's not a gender. That's the only gender thing that annoyed me. I figure most other creatures and races we see do make babies.
I do however find it odd for Leonin females to have 2 breasts indicating they don't have litters (Kemba, Kha Regent). So would a female Minotaur have her breast plate down low on her abdomen? Is it a single breast plate for her udders (Merciless Javelineer)? Do female Merfolk give live birth? If they don't lactate then why have breasts (Kiora, the Crashing Wave)? These are the questions that need answering! :P
September 28, 2017 11:52 p.m.
Jimmy_Chinchila says... #3
windlnk oh good call. I'm psyched for him. Saw a Minotaur on some card art and was like why is there only one Minotaur on this whole plane? Looks sick though.
Similarly I was confused why Vraska's Contempt mentions whispers of her stony gaze, wouldn't people be like holy crap there's a weird reptile lady with snake like tendrils for hair? I mean, if you've never seen a Gorgon... that's freaky.
September 28, 2017 11:56 p.m.
Haha, good point. I would think the crazy hair-tendrils, and overall alien look would be overt enough. I suppose they whisper about that too because they don't want to spend time as statues.
windlnk says... #1
Angrath.
Also lots of cards mention a male captain named Brandis Thorn who may get a card in Rivals of Ixalan as well.
September 28, 2017 11:50 p.m.