Quote from: GeekyBugle on May 19, 2023, 01:12:20 PM

Quote from: hedgehobbit on May 19, 2023, 08:17:09 AM
Here's an article from Playing at the World about early complaints. Note that the vast majority of these complaints are coming from male feminists, not actual women.

https://medium.com/@increment/the-first-female-gamers-c784fbe3ff37

And as all male feminists it lies:

QuoteIn 1943, Pratt wrote that "today there are nearly as many players of one sex as the other."

Now, that asertion could very well be true for his small circle at wartime when millions of men were figthing the war not playing pretend war like the pratt.

But you just need to look at the complaints and conventions to know this was a lie back then and keeps on being one today.

That isn't a generalization for all time -- it's quoting Pratt to describe the circumstances of when and where Pratt was running. The same article also explicitly describes how there were almost no women participating in the late 1960s wargaming scene - noting only 3 distinctly female names out of 600 subscribers to Avalon Hill's "The General" magazine. It then describes a larger number of women participating in early D&D, with Gary Gygax claiming in 1979 that "at least 10% of the players are female".

All this is in line with what I read from other sources. The numbers can change back and forth. In 1999, the big demographic survey prior to 3E found that TRPG players were 19% female.

Incidentally, the slightly more extended quote from Fletcher Pratt's Naval War Game (1943) was apparently:

Quotethe sweet-hearts-and-wives influence became manifest. One of the latter appeared as a spectator of what was originally intended to be a purely stag game. In the midst of the ensuing red-hot engagement she was discovered flat on her stomach, aiming the guns of a cruiser and muttering something like "I'll get so-and-so this time." From that date on there was no checking the rising tide of feminism. Today there are nearly as many players of one sex as of the other, and one of the feminine delegation has been praised by a naval officer as the most competent tactician of the group.

Source: https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/1833569/vintage-quote-about-wargames-and-women

They must be mistaken!

6e D&D will have 50% female players, but 75% of those will have (or had) a penis.

Quote from: Spinachcat on May 22, 2023, 02:49:11 AM
6e D&D will have 50% female players, but 75% of those will have (or had) a penis.

You mean the writers of 6E will.

Based on the 5e fanbase, I have no doubt the 6e fanbase will be a shitshow of freaks, their always-online "allies" and subservient gimps desperate to play "the current edition" regardless because they only play "the current edition".

If I wasn't already a gamer for decades, I could not imagine walking into a 2023 game store or 2023 convention and saying "This looks fun! I want to join these people in their hobby!"

Fortunately, the OSR draws in the very worst dregs of society and it's full of dangerous wrong thinkers so I'll always have a full game table wherever my Mos Eisley sets up.

Quote from: Mishihari on May 19, 2023, 01:51:20 AM
No, that's standard and correct usage, and it has been for a very long time

Yea, this.

The push away from neutral he was done for political reasons and only political reasons- even moreso today than back in the 70s.
Here's an article from the late 1970s created with the goal of providing political motivation ("it hurts women to talk normal!") for pushing against normalcy and the neutral he, which was, at this point in time, totally standard.

https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1979-25474-001

Quote from: jhkim on May 19, 2023, 10:57:55 AM

Quote from: SHARK on May 19, 2023, 02:14:20 AM
When Gygax was using He or She, that was from being influenced from pressure by fucking Feminists at the time that had infiltrated our schools, and had begun whining and crying about it. Again, how do we know? Because all of this BS started in the late 1960's with the Liberals and the Feminists being brainfucked by Marxist revolutionaries and hippies.

Just ten or twenty years prior, no one whined about this kind of BS.

That train has left the station, and now we are where we are at, with all new stupid "pronouns", our language being mangled left, right and center, and people everywhere being offended by something.

Factually, I agree that Gygax's use of "he and she" was an influence from the 1960s feminist movement. So it's been in the game since the original AD&D.

Also, in terms of actual language usage, "he" was never gender neutral. As used prior to the 1960s, it implied always or typically male. The older usage pattern was:

(1) Always male - use "he"
(2) Typically but not always male - like doctor, police, professor, politician, etc. - use "he"
(3) Typically but not always female - like secretary or nurse - use "she"
(4) Always female - use "she"

Even though there were male secretaries in the 1950s, people didn't use "he" as the gender-neutral pronoun for secretaries. They'd say "she" instead.


In terms of opinion, I don't agree about your characterization of the time. Prior to the 1960s, I don't think one can deny that society was sexist. Women frequently couldn't get their own bank account or credit card, could be legally discriminated against in job hiring or college admissions, couldn't serve on juries (i.e. 1957's "Twelve Angry Men"), and so forth. The prejudice wasn't subtle - it was outright legal and social inequality. So I don't agree that 1960s feminists were whiny crybabies over nothing, as you characterize them.

The reason a woman couldn't get a bank account, was because of the concept of coverture. Her provision was part of marriage. The reason you had to use the term "frequently" is because a single woman could have her own bank account, do business, etc. And even women under coverture could do/have these things. It depends on how the coverture laws were set up.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coverture

As usual, it's a lot more nuanced than Feminism portrayed. Feminists weren't being whiny crybabies. They misdiagnosed the issues and did a sloppy job in advocating for women's "rights". In some cases, intentionally in order to further ideologies.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redstockings

Quote from: jhkim on May 19, 2023, 10:57:55 AM
Also, in terms of actual language usage, "he" was never gender neutral. As used prior to the 1960s, it implied always or typically male. The older usage pattern was:

(1) Always male - use "he"
(2) Typically but not always male - like doctor, police, professor, politician, etc. - use "he"
(3) Typically but not always female - like secretary or nurse - use "she"
(4) Always female - use "she"

Even though there were male secretaries in the 1950s, people didn't use "he" as the gender-neutral pronoun for secretaries. They'd say "she" instead.

Quote from: Venka on May 23, 2023, 12:55:36 AM
The push away from neutral he was done for political reasons and only political reasons- even moreso today than back in the 70s.
Here's an article from the late 1970s created with the goal of providing political motivation ("it hurts women to talk normal!") for pushing against normalcy and the neutral he, which was, at this point in time, totally standard.

https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1979-25474-001

As I noted, "he" wasn't actually used in a neutral fashion. That might be a theoretical, but it never matched actual usage. In practice, people used "he" or "she" depending on whether they pictured typically male or female.

Quote from: Ratman_tf on May 23, 2023, 01:33:04 AM

Quote from: jhkim on May 19, 2023, 10:57:55 AM
Prior to the 1960s, I don't think one can deny that society was sexist. Women frequently couldn't get their own bank account or credit card, could be legally discriminated against in job hiring or college admissions, couldn't serve on juries (i.e. 1957's "Twelve Angry Men"), and so forth. The prejudice wasn't subtle - it was outright legal and social inequality. So I don't agree that 1960s feminists were whiny crybabies over nothing, as you characterize them.

The reason a woman couldn't get a bank account, was because of the concept of coverture. Her provision was part of marriage. The reason you had to use the term "frequently" is because a single woman could have her own bank account, do business, etc. And even women under coverture could do/have these things. It depends on how the coverture laws were set up.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coverture

As usual, it's a lot more nuanced than Feminism portrayed. Feminists weren't being whiny crybabies. They misdiagnosed the issues and did a sloppy job in advocating for women's "rights". In some cases, intentionally in order to further ideologies.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redstockings

I didn't use the term "coverture", but I don't see how that changes what I said. Coverture is overtly sexist. A husband can get an independent bank account, but a wife cannot. Also, single women were also often discriminated against - like requiring an unmarried woman to get a cosignature for an account or credit card by her father or other male relative, while not doing the same for unmarried men. The Equal Credit Opportunity Act of 1974 was a well-reasoned response to this sort of discrimination.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equal_Credit_Opportunity_Act

Dude come back after you've seen the graphs showing the rate of credit card debt in America after women were legally allowed to have them.

And before you go off on "edumacation" bear in mind that no such public service has ever been granted to anyone prior to that change,

to this day,

kind of like it was more important to give as many people credit cards as possible and withhold the risks from them from the get go.

Especially given to women so that they could get high on the freedoms while deliberately setting them up not understnad the responsiblities

Quote from: jhkim on May 23, 2023, 11:19:47 PM

As I noted, "he" wasn't actually used in a neutral fashion. That might be a theoretical, but it never matched actual usage. In practice, people used "he" or "she" depending on whether they pictured typically male or female.

Sure, people would say "she" for like a secretary.  But that was because you pretty much knew it was a woman (and your guess was well based in math!).

Quote from: jhkim on May 23, 2023, 11:19:47 PM

Quote from: jhkim on May 19, 2023, 10:57:55 AM
Also, in terms of actual language usage, "he" was never gender neutral. As used prior to the 1960s, it implied always or typically male. The older usage pattern was:

(1) Always male - use "he"
(2) Typically but not always male - like doctor, police, professor, politician, etc. - use "he"
(3) Typically but not always female - like secretary or nurse - use "she"
(4) Always female - use "she"

Even though there were male secretaries in the 1950s, people didn't use "he" as the gender-neutral pronoun for secretaries. They'd say "she" instead.

Quote from: Venka on May 23, 2023, 12:55:36 AM
The push away from neutral he was done for political reasons and only political reasons- even moreso today than back in the 70s.
Here's an article from the late 1970s created with the goal of providing political motivation ("it hurts women to talk normal!") for pushing against normalcy and the neutral he, which was, at this point in time, totally standard.

https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1979-25474-001

As I noted, "he" wasn't actually used in a neutral fashion. That might be a theoretical, but it never matched actual usage. In practice, people used "he" or "she" depending on whether they pictured typically male or female.

Quote from: Ratman_tf on May 23, 2023, 01:33:04 AM

Quote from: jhkim on May 19, 2023, 10:57:55 AM
Prior to the 1960s, I don't think one can deny that society was sexist. Women frequently couldn't get their own bank account or credit card, could be legally discriminated against in job hiring or college admissions, couldn't serve on juries (i.e. 1957's "Twelve Angry Men"), and so forth. The prejudice wasn't subtle - it was outright legal and social inequality. So I don't agree that 1960s feminists were whiny crybabies over nothing, as you characterize them.

The reason a woman couldn't get a bank account, was because of the concept of coverture. Her provision was part of marriage. The reason you had to use the term "frequently" is because a single woman could have her own bank account, do business, etc. And even women under coverture could do/have these things. It depends on how the coverture laws were set up.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coverture

As usual, it's a lot more nuanced than Feminism portrayed. Feminists weren't being whiny crybabies. They misdiagnosed the issues and did a sloppy job in advocating for women's "rights". In some cases, intentionally in order to further ideologies.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redstockings

I didn't use the term "coverture", but I don't see how that changes what I said.

You didn't give any context. You just left it there as some kind of example of how things were unfair to women, ignoring the fact that it was a convention around marriage and how households worked at the time.

QuoteCoverture is overtly sexist. A husband can get an independent bank account, but a wife cannot. Also, single women were also often discriminated against - like requiring an unmarried woman to get a cosignature for an account or credit card by her father or other male relative, while not doing the same for unmarried men. The Equal Credit Opportunity Act of 1974 was a well-reasoned response to this sort of discrimination.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equal_Credit_Opportunity_Act

Life was sexist. People are unequal. As modern life made such conventions obsolete, they were due for a revision. Not because, as a feminist might say, The Man (literally) was keepin the wimmin folk down, but because modern society and technology meant that women were freed from certain physical and social burdens. Most notably, the invention of modern birth control methods.

Quote from: GeekyBugle on May 19, 2023, 02:18:59 AM
The earliest would be The Dragon issue 39, I think it's the first time the feminist complaints were given any serious attention from TSR, but it wouldn't be the last.

Edited to add:

Dragon Issue 57 presents us one of those "I'll take shit that never happened for a billion Alex" stories feminists love to tell. Not forgetting the comic strip mocking the chainmail bikini.

I'm sorry to burst anyone's bubble but the rot was already there back in the 80s

That's not rot though. They posted this stuff because they thought it was nonesense. Kask mentioned stuff like this in some of his interviews.

It was not till into the Loraine era and the 90s wave of woke moral outrage that we saw more and more changes entering into 2e.

There was one game that had a rather interesting solution to the whole he or she problem -- the generic pronouns used were male on the even-numbered pages, female on the odd-numbered pages, or something like that.

I remember thinking it was a clever way to sidestep the issue.

Quote from: Ghostmaker on May 24, 2023, 08:43:38 AM
There was one game that had a rather interesting solution to the whole he or she problem -- the generic pronouns used were male on the even-numbered pages, female on the odd-numbered pages, or something like that.

I remember thinking it was a clever way to sidestep the issue.

I think the game could have fixed it by setting up a subscription for a SSRI anti-depressant subscription for those users who can handle seeing male used as the default.  Maybe they could have even packaged the pills to look like miniature D20's.