Why couldn’t Aerhien have been a man? Were you that committed to the “perfect eyelash” line? Would having a dead spouse be an uncompelling backstory for a male character?
Uh… I have to ask, at this point, if you’ve ever tried your hand at writing fiction. Some characters are male, some characters are female, some can be either. The hero might have been either-able. Aerhien wasn’t. She is the wise female council leader, not the wise male council leader. Galadriel and Elrond are not interchangeable. And besides, she was female in my mind and that’s that.
I honestly haven’t the vaguest idea. In the beginning I was visualizing Aerhien as having pointed ears, which made her light-elvish, but I decided against that. Generally I don’t give my characters a color unless they need an ethnic background.
You know when it comes to racism, people say: ” I don’t care if they’re black, white, purple or green”… Ooh hold on now: Purple or Green? You gotta draw the line somewhere! To hell with purple people! - Unless they’re suffocating—then help’em.
~Mitch Hedburg
Yes, I have. I guess you just didn’t communicate the essential female-ness of Aerhien very effectively (at least to me), because it didn’t seem to me like it was very important to what limited character development she got.
I guess you just didn’t communicate the essential female-ness of Aerhien very effectively (at least to me), because it didn’t seem to me like it was very important to what limited character development she got.
The background story that was alluded to came across quite clearly. Not only did the character emerge sufficiently that a sex change would have felt awkward, it left me grasping for the tantalising details that couldn’t quite be fit into the short story format.
The question of “what gender is”, when you strip away the purely anatomical, is a topic of great interest to me.
It seems to me that while Aerhien’s gender wasn’t essential to the story, there were certain aspects of her personality that hinted at it (and I’m not talking about the eyelashes) -- but I wouldn’t go beyond that; if she had been written as male, I don’t think I would have sensed any incongruity.
Without further biasing the discussion by mentioning what I think those personality aspects might be, I’m curious to find out what attributes other people thought made her essentially female—among those who hold this position, that is.
Are we arguing about some Platonic “essentials”, in that fictional characters “actually exist somewhere”? I believe that the fictional characters were formed in Eliezer’s brain as representations of certain archetypes (such as, as he noted, the “wise female council leader”) that he felt best represented the characterization he was intending to give them.
It doesn’t mean the story wouldn’t work if the characters were given different genders or other different characteristics. It means that the author would find it unfitting to his semi-conscious concept of the story and its fictional setting, which is unknown to us except for what’s revealed in the text, and is necessarily richer than the text. Or at least, I generously assume that this is what Eliezer was arguing—that “she had to be female” meant “I believe she worked best as female as the representation of my character role concept”, not a postulation of some fictional Platonism.
Some characters are male, some characters are female, some can be either. The hero might have been either-able. Aerhien wasn’t.
Yes, all fine and good — but why not? As Alicorn said, her sex hardly seems relevant to what limited character development she got. Aside from perhaps the eyelash line, and making the lover a woman if you wanted Aerhien to be straight, I struggle to think of anything in this story that would not work equally well if Aerhien were a man.
And besides, she was female in my mind and that’s that.
He could. I just would have been surprised to see it mentioned in a story. It’s rarely considered to bear mentioning in a work of fiction if a male character has perfect eyelashes and happens to bat/dip/flutter them, unless this is used as a way to lampshade some stereotypical notion of effeminacy.
And for the part of that story that would not sit well with feminists (1) , check out this excerpt :
The Confessor held up a hand. ”… Do you know there was a time when nonconsensual sex was illegal?”
Akon wasn’t sure whether to smile or grimace. “The Prohibition, right? During the first century pre-Net? I expect everyone was glad to have that law taken off the books. I can’t imagine how boring your sex lives must have been up until then—flirting with a woman, teasing her, leading her on, knowing the whole time that you were perfectly safe because she couldn’t take matters into her own hands if you went a little too far—”
...
“Um,” Akon said. He was trying not to smile. “I’m trying to visualize what sort of disaster could have been caused by too much nonconsensual sex—”
Yeah, I could almost hear the simultaneous clicking of the “back” button in all the web browsers of female readers who are now forever disenchanted with this site because of misogyny oozing out of this story.
Seriously, is there always a hidden meaning in subtleties like these? I remember a feminist one time (not Alicorn) criticizing Robin_Hanson on overcomingbias.com and being utterly confused by her points. She would spend long, boring paragraphs dwelling on such minor things as:
-the inclusion of Oxford’s emblem on the site
-Robin_Hanson’s failure to carefully distinguish sex (biological?) from gender (cultural?), which most women supposedly reflect deeply upon and are careful to distinguish.
-the supposed misogyny in the picture at the header of OB (Odysseus lashing himself to the mast to resist the sirens’ call) because it somehow implies that all women are evil temptresses. … Even though the sirens actually look male to me, or at least like very unusual females.
(Digression: I’ve seen numerous pictures of men doing mean things on pictures on web sites, but never felt that it was trying to say e.g. “All men are murderers” unless that was also found in the body of the website”. And in any case, other men would roll their eyes at me and my strangeness if I made such a criticism.)
But of course, after spending all that time on those issues, she never got to the actual substance of Robin_Hanson’s posts and what made them so anti-women. It seemed to be all about cherry-picking incidental background things such that Robin_Hanson could write almost anything and be classified as a woman hater. So what’s the point of trying?
To bring this back to your comment, Alicorn: You could very well be offended by these gender choices. Your entire social group could be offended. But that still wouldn’t justify adherence to the standards you seem to expect.
If people are expected to filter their writing through such a fine-meshed screen that they have to justify the gender of each and every character, and the presence of any artwork, or heuristic about women that is invoked, people may as well stop writing. Because they will never be able to make enough sense of the rules to accurately adhere to them. Instead, they’ll just throw a blanket self-prohibition on anything remotely close to violating the spirit of the rules, and end up either spouting vague pleasantries, or in perpetual editorial review, or just not writing at all.
And the behavior of women, including their admiration of those who flout these rules, will continue unabated.
Why couldn’t Aerhien have been a man? Were you that committed to the “perfect eyelash” line? Would having a dead spouse be an uncompelling backstory for a male character?
Uh… I have to ask, at this point, if you’ve ever tried your hand at writing fiction. Some characters are male, some characters are female, some can be either. The hero might have been either-able. Aerhien wasn’t. She is the wise female council leader, not the wise male council leader. Galadriel and Elrond are not interchangeable. And besides, she was female in my mind and that’s that.
What I want to know is if any of them are black.
I honestly haven’t the vaguest idea. In the beginning I was visualizing Aerhien as having pointed ears, which made her light-elvish, but I decided against that. Generally I don’t give my characters a color unless they need an ethnic background.
Make her octarine. That would be eminently appropriate.
You know when it comes to racism, people say: ” I don’t care if they’re black, white, purple or green”… Ooh hold on now: Purple or Green? You gotta draw the line somewhere! To hell with purple people! - Unless they’re suffocating—then help’em. ~Mitch Hedburg
Yes, I have. I guess you just didn’t communicate the essential female-ness of Aerhien very effectively (at least to me), because it didn’t seem to me like it was very important to what limited character development she got.
The background story that was alluded to came across quite clearly. Not only did the character emerge sufficiently that a sex change would have felt awkward, it left me grasping for the tantalising details that couldn’t quite be fit into the short story format.
The question of “what gender is”, when you strip away the purely anatomical, is a topic of great interest to me.
It seems to me that while Aerhien’s gender wasn’t essential to the story, there were certain aspects of her personality that hinted at it (and I’m not talking about the eyelashes) -- but I wouldn’t go beyond that; if she had been written as male, I don’t think I would have sensed any incongruity.
Without further biasing the discussion by mentioning what I think those personality aspects might be, I’m curious to find out what attributes other people thought made her essentially female—among those who hold this position, that is.
“Essential” in what sense?
Are we arguing about some Platonic “essentials”, in that fictional characters “actually exist somewhere”? I believe that the fictional characters were formed in Eliezer’s brain as representations of certain archetypes (such as, as he noted, the “wise female council leader”) that he felt best represented the characterization he was intending to give them.
It doesn’t mean the story wouldn’t work if the characters were given different genders or other different characteristics. It means that the author would find it unfitting to his semi-conscious concept of the story and its fictional setting, which is unknown to us except for what’s revealed in the text, and is necessarily richer than the text. Or at least, I generously assume that this is what Eliezer was arguing—that “she had to be female” meant “I believe she worked best as female as the representation of my character role concept”, not a postulation of some fictional Platonism.
Yes, all fine and good — but why not? As Alicorn said, her sex hardly seems relevant to what limited character development she got. Aside from perhaps the eyelash line, and making the lover a woman if you wanted Aerhien to be straight, I struggle to think of anything in this story that would not work equally well if Aerhien were a man.
See now, that’s a rationale I can get behind.
My guess is that Aerhien was inspired by a specific character from another story.
Either that, or Eliezer simply liked the name. But, yeah, that’s a good question.
Actually, I was reminded of the immortal empress in Harry Turtledove’s novel “Noninterference”.
Why couldn’t a man dip his perfect eyelashes?
He could. I just would have been surprised to see it mentioned in a story. It’s rarely considered to bear mentioning in a work of fiction if a male character has perfect eyelashes and happens to bat/dip/flutter them, unless this is used as a way to lampshade some stereotypical notion of effeminacy.
He was suddenly very aware that he hadn’t checked his lipstick in three hours.
And for the part of that story that would not sit well with feminists (1) , check out this excerpt :
Interesting discussion follows in the comments.
(1) ETA: Or me, or most people in general.
Yeah, I could almost hear the simultaneous clicking of the “back” button in all the web browsers of female readers who are now forever disenchanted with this site because of misogyny oozing out of this story.
Seriously, is there always a hidden meaning in subtleties like these? I remember a feminist one time (not Alicorn) criticizing Robin_Hanson on overcomingbias.com and being utterly confused by her points. She would spend long, boring paragraphs dwelling on such minor things as:
-the inclusion of Oxford’s emblem on the site
-Robin_Hanson’s failure to carefully distinguish sex (biological?) from gender (cultural?), which most women supposedly reflect deeply upon and are careful to distinguish.
-the supposed misogyny in the picture at the header of OB (Odysseus lashing himself to the mast to resist the sirens’ call) because it somehow implies that all women are evil temptresses. … Even though the sirens actually look male to me, or at least like very unusual females.
(Digression: I’ve seen numerous pictures of men doing mean things on pictures on web sites, but never felt that it was trying to say e.g. “All men are murderers” unless that was also found in the body of the website”. And in any case, other men would roll their eyes at me and my strangeness if I made such a criticism.)
But of course, after spending all that time on those issues, she never got to the actual substance of Robin_Hanson’s posts and what made them so anti-women. It seemed to be all about cherry-picking incidental background things such that Robin_Hanson could write almost anything and be classified as a woman hater. So what’s the point of trying?
To bring this back to your comment, Alicorn: You could very well be offended by these gender choices. Your entire social group could be offended. But that still wouldn’t justify adherence to the standards you seem to expect.
If people are expected to filter their writing through such a fine-meshed screen that they have to justify the gender of each and every character, and the presence of any artwork, or heuristic about women that is invoked, people may as well stop writing. Because they will never be able to make enough sense of the rules to accurately adhere to them. Instead, they’ll just throw a blanket self-prohibition on anything remotely close to violating the spirit of the rules, and end up either spouting vague pleasantries, or in perpetual editorial review, or just not writing at all.
And the behavior of women, including their admiration of those who flout these rules, will continue unabated.