I've been lurking for a while, watching the menstruation debate (largely between male gamers) and finally felt the urge to delurk for one comment...
Ian Gorlick scribed:
>Players with female characters in Glorantha should have to put up with
>menstrual cramps, pregnancy, and sexual discrimination. The world will
>be less believable if these aren't there. It would be a nicer world if
>those weren't there, but I don't think that 'nice' is something we are
>seeking in Glorantha.
Okay, that got me riled! As a member of that 52% of the population that does have to put up with these things in RL (though not the pregnancy bit yet, thank Latex!) I'll be damned if I'm going to allow someone running a RPG to tell me as a player that my character is going to miss out on an evening's adventuring because my character has cramps!
Women who are unfortunate enough to suffer from menstrual cramps are well aware of their debilitating nature, and will do almost anything to avoid them. In the Real World, this means taking appropriate pain killing drugs, grabbing a hot water bottle, and growling at their menfolks who chide them for letting a "little bit of pain get you down". For those of you out there lacking the extra X chromosome that allows you to share in these joys, imagine having a boot to the testicles combined with a red hot poker impaled in your guts for anything up to three days at a time.
Now, I'm not sure about the rest of you out there, but I roleplay for FUN! The regular Friday night game of RQ is an escape from the real world, a time that I can be someone else, and do things that I could never do in this concrete and work-a-day world.
Ian, If you start adding the unpleasant but "real" parts of life in to your RPG, while not make the male characters make saving rolls each year they age against Prostate enlargement, and describe to them in exquisite detail the agony of trying to piss when it feels like they are passing razor blades?
Surely in a world as full of magic as Glorantha, the first use of magic that any female would be taught on becoming a woman would be a small charm to remove the pain of menstruation. Why isn't it written up in any of the books? Because it's women's business, and not spoken of to the menfolk. And as for the blood and other mess that goes with it? Hah! Ever ask yourself what the PCs use for toilet paper? Ever felt like going into that sort of detail? Want to explain why they never seem to have excrement caked under their fingernails when they shake the hand of the Lunar Governor of Pavis? (Now there's a plot waiting to happen!)
No? I didn't think so.. This is a Fantasy roleplaying game. There are limits to the levels of reality is is necessary to go into. Sandy, I loved your mythic reasons why women menstruate, and will incorporate them into games when appropriate, but Ian, there is NO WAY I am going to torture my players and myself by bringing the level of gritty reality into my games that you would appear to be arguing for!
They simply don't deserve that level of punishment!
Errhrrm.. Right..
(steps down off soapbox!)
Yours,
Marion
avimort_at_aurora.cc.monash.edu.au
avimort_at_zikzak.net
End of Glorantha Digest V3 #179
WWW material at http://hops.wharton.upenn.edu/~loren/rolegame.html
Powered by hypermail