Re: AW: Vedr. Re: In Defence Of A Goddess - A

From: David Cake <dave_at_z7teK6ljKxCaNToAJVG-L-vxu-JSTLUTDOxDEwW8Z9SGmF4zcMGk4oHRghMDmYCocldj5aQ>
Date: Tue, 15 May 2007 03:16:31 +0800

        Jeff and I, i think by mistake, ended up taking a thread of this discussion private, and (with Jeffs permission) I'd like to make it public again, because there are quite a lot of interesting issues coming up.

        I realise its got a bit long and
involved, and not everyone may be interested any more. But then again, you don't have to read it.

At 7:00 PM +0200 14/5/07, Jeff Richard wrote:
>
>> >Greg long ago established Orlanth as the Men's God and Ernalda as the
>> >Women's God.
>>
>> Yes, and did so in a relatively clumsy retcon for the many
>>Orlanthi women in Glorantha (both in play and in his own writing). To
>>which the Vinga cult as the female path into Orlanth was an elegant
>>solution for the most part. Which he is now damaging pointlessly, but
>>apparently not as much as the cult would be damaged if you got to
>>make the decisions instead of him, as you seem to have a stronger
>>position than he does.
>
>Here's the real problem with Vinga - she's been blown out of
>proportion as the Cult for Women Roleplayers (even if our anecdotal
>experience is that far more men play Vinga than women).

        And the reasons WHY she has been blown out of proportion in that way have been fully discussed. Largely, because its a way you can create a female adventurer that isn't a psycho (other routes having largely been gradually closed off), and because a lot of other roles for female characters have been closed.

        I'm not sure exactly what the 'problem' here is. That the character has become enough of a fan favourite that people react badly to sexist belittling? Well, yes, but thats only a 'problem' for you and Greg - for the rest of us, the problem is the sexist belittling in the first place.

> Talking to
>Greg, we think what we are going to do in the future is simply tie
>Vinga to Orlanth Adventurous. She's the Woman's subcult of Orlanth
>Adventurous, which means she is not directly connected to Allfather or
>Thunderous (and cannot access their magic).

        But surely you realise that if you do
this without making some other way for women to be war leaders, or have access to storm magic, you are actually making the problems that people are objecting to worse rather than better?

        If you wish to say that Vinga is simply the Womens subcult or Orlanth Adventurous, are you implying there are Womens subcults of Orlanth Allfather and Orlanth Thunderous, as yet unidentified despite their social importance? Or that women have direct access to these sub-cults without needing a 'special' subcult to allow access?

	Because I'm somehow guessing you don't mean the former.
	And because if you mean the latter (and 
your comments about the way appropriate leaders are considered initiates of Dar the Chief etc even if they don't have that cult background might be considered that way), then that would be a big change and rather at odds with your position so far. Though frankly, I'd welcome it.

        And if you mean neither, then this change would be in effect saying 'yes, thats right, Orlanthi are, at their core, sexist to the utter core'. Which would be consistent with other attitudes, but would be pretty alienating to a large percentage of people interested in Glorantha. It would be saying women don't get access to the standard gods of being (and, to at least some meaningful extent, to the social roles of) chief, lawspeaker, head weaponthane, farmer carl, etc.

>Vinga is one of several Red-Haired Goddess - and probably one of the
>lesser ones (at least in the background, if not in the dedication of
>some of the people on the Immod list). The Red Woman of Saird,
>Redalda, and Hwarin Dalthippa all have more worshipers.

	Sure, if you must.
	Though the sudden elevation of Redalda to 
the status of terribly important and empowerful* goddess for women (after all, what could be more exciting than horse-breeding!) is baffling. And the idea that its a warrior cult would seem to have absolutely no relation to anything written about the goddess in her own actual cult writeup, and be entirely based on the one short paragraph one her as a special sub-cult of Elmal allowing women special dispensation to do something manly. Its a sort of mini-, solar, Vinga, no doubt due to be retconned in turn should players start to find it interesting. I can almost foresee the whole saga going on in miniature again, if people actually took this seriously - people play tough Redaldan warriors, Jeff and Greg eventually jump in to deride this stereotype as being just a creation of a few enthusiastic players, ignore that they started the whole idea (as Greg started the whole idea of empowered Orlanthi female leaders with Kallyr), and remind us that she is really a very feminine god of horsebreeding and a subservient wife to Elmal.

        Also, its pretty obvious that the focus of Heortling play so far is Sartar and Dragon Pass, not Saird or Sylila. While revelations about the no-doubt terribly empowered Red Women of Saird are welcome, they aren't really going to fix the problem in anyone who plays in the mainstream documented material.

>
>> (he didn't really need to worry about all those male Ernaldan
>>characters, of course. As we've established, there pretty much were
>>no Ernaldan characters, male or female, in active play at all, and
>>almost none in the literature either)
>
>Huh? I've had an Ernaldan in ever campaign I've run for the last ten
>plus years. In my own games, Erilindia, Queen Beneva Chan, Henemara
>of Ernandel, Queen Orenernaldesta of Nidham and Ferernalda of Voria's
>Hill have all been important and significant Ernaldan NPCs in my
>games. Ernalda has always figured far more prominently in my games
>than Vinga.

        OK, so you have active Ernaldan NPCs.
Good for you for practicing what you preach - you aren't exactly typical in this respect, though. I've had Ernaldan NPCs in my games too.

        I'll just note that none were so
important as to actually have stats written for them in the entirety of RuneQuest publication as far as I can find, and we were able to come up with pretty much one named Ernaldan in Gregs historical writing (prior to the Heortling history I presume).

>> Actually, the problem is that you referred to Vingas divine
>>displeasure for heterosexually active Vingans, referred to Divine
>>Wrath being visited on the clan of straight Vingans, said pregnancy
>>diminished their link to the goddess.
>
>No - Vingans get in trouble for the consequences of heterosexuality.
>Actually just for pregnancy.

        The fine distinction doesn't really
change the issues significantly - and you quite clearly indicated that this is intended to act as a strong deterrent to heterosexual behaviour in any case, and that you think heterosexual behaviour is strongly outlawed.

>
>> And that when a Vingan gets pregnant its not just a minority
>>preference, its not just a social embarrasment or big problem - you
>>said it usually leads to her being despised and outlawed. So a Vingan
>>who has heterosexual sex is courting outlawry.
>
>If she gets pregnant, she is courting trouble. A woman who is
>magically functioning as a man is going to have problems if she
>manifests some of the most basic "women's magic".

        She is magically taking on a mans social role. Its your attitude that social roles and biology MUST be innately tied *even in deities whose function is to break that link* that is the issue. None of the rest of us have a big problem with the idea that a goddess can let women take on the male social role while still remaining biologically female.

        (and as for the 'most basic womens magic' bit - Vingans have undergone Ernaldan initiation according to ST)

>> >There probably are no Urox women. Or if they are they are very few.
>> >Urox is a Bull. Based on Harmastsaga, Urox is s a very phallic god,
>> >like Lodril. Storm Bull may well be different.
>>
>> If you feel a desperate urge to publicly overrule the
>>straightforward "Women are accepted, but few join." that is in Storm
>>Tribe just so you can indulge this particular urge to make all the
>>gods more proscriptive when it comes to gender roles, then just be
>>prepared to have this fight all over again but nastier.
>
>Again, that is something for player characters. Check out the
>activities of the Uroxings in Harmastbook,

        If I had access to Harmastbook, I would.

> check out their fertillity
>rites with Eiritha. Urox is the Bull - heck, a common term used by
>Heortlings to describe Uroxings is Big Dick.

        Sure, Urox is a male deity, and a very male deity. Thats not the same thing as saying he has only male worshippers.

        You could just as well as well say, for example, that the Red Goddess is a very female and feminine goddess, always described in feminine terms, etc and so her worshippers should be female.

>
>> Also, can I just point out that in the Vinga debate on WOG,
>>Greg also specifically mentioned Urox as a published cult female
>>warriors could join.
>
>Sure, player characters can join pretty much anything they want. And
>do. If it works in the game, IŽll let a player do all sorts of things
>that a story character or an NPC cannot.

        That seems a very weird attitude - surely some story characters can be exceptional and unusual as well?

>>Or,
>>somewhat creepily, that having wildly different conceptions of the
>>same deity is fine (Ernalda as gangster?!) *except* when it comes to
>>gender roles, in which case deviance from the divine path must be
>>strongly stamped on.
>
>In Esrolia, the Esrolian Grandmothers run their clans as absolute
>dictators with the power of life and death over the members of their
>kinship groups. Ernalda can be cold, ruthless, pragmatic, vengeful
>and completely unmerciful. And I can certainly imagine a female
>Michael Corleone as an initiate of Ernalda the Queen.

        And those cold, ruthless, vengeful and unmerciful Ernaldans are, you will notice, in almost complete contrast to the virtues of Great Ernalda - nurturing, and peaceful.

>I never said all or even most Vingans are lesbians. I do think that
>women who magically get to function as men are going to have magical
>consequences if they behave as Ernaldans.

        And no one but you, and maybe Greg,
thinks that shagging blokes is magically reserved only for Ernalda. Or even giving birth. Indeed, on the face of it, it seems somewhat absurd, and would seem to have consequences for every cult that admits women.

>BTW, I am bored of the terms "gay" and "straight" when used to
>describe pre-Modern cultures. The Orlanthi don't think in terms of
>gay or straight.

        Its a little late in the game to play
this one. I'm not disagreeing with the basic anthropology... but you've already manouvered yourself into a position that actually depends on the gay and straight categories being observed *when you think its important*. Your position on Vinga is that its a special case in which suddenly the Orlanthi DO start caring about the difference between gay and straight - why?

>For an Orlanthi male - like in many tribal cultures
>- there is no social stigma for same-gender sexual activity (although
>it is probably insulting to be accused of being on the receiving end -
>again that was the case in many premodern cultures that had no
>problems with same-sex sexual activity).

        Yes, the old pre-modern "I'm not gay, but my boyfriend is" attitude.

> For an Ernaldan female,
>there is no social stigma for same sex activity. Orlanthi and
>Ernaldans merely fixate on violation of the marriage contract -
>unmarried folk can do what they want.

        Which would, of course, logically then lead to 'if Vinga is considered a man, and there is no stigma for men to have sex with men, then there is no stigma for sex with men', as I think we can all conceded at this point.

>
>For the minor cults, it is not necessarily so flexible.

        Why? Its the inconsistency you introduce at this point that is the problem.

> Vinga is a
>woman functioning as a man - and is the rare goddess who does not
>partcipate in Ernalda's inner rites -

        Goddesses don't all have exclusively
female worshippers. Nor other gods exclusively male.

>and her worshipers can get in
>magical trouble if they start acting like Ernaldan women.

	And no one has a problem with that.
	But its your specific decision here to 
equate acting like an Ernaldan woman with acting the part of a woman sexually.

        No one is saying Vingans should be
housekeepers or full time child carers or healers. That is what acting like an Ernaldan woman is like.

        Its when you take it that step further and say Vingans get in trouble if they act like a biological woman that you start to show a double standard, and seem to go out of your way to restrict Vinga even more than is consistent with Orlanthi society.

>You want sexual freedom for women? Play an unmarried Ernaldan women.

        Ah, yes. Of course you can have sexual freedom, provided you stick rigidly to your gender role. How empowering.

>You want to play a woman who gets to be part of the Orlanth
>Adventurous cult? Play a Vingan. Want a sexually liberated woman who
>gets to be part of the Orlanth Adventurous cult? Play a Vingan very
>carefully.

        As I said in an earlier message - yes, Heortling society is pretty sexist, and no one has problems with their being social consequences to sex and pregnancy (there always are).

        But its the idea that the deities whose role is to escape rigid gender roles are actually MORE sexist when it comes to sexual behaviour that seems completely inconsistent. And seems to be rooted in this idea that the social roles and biology can't be separated when the very existence of Vinga shows they clearly can.

>
>> >No, but in Orlanthi culture a man who does housework or childcare
>> >needs Ernalda magic. Not Orlanth's magic.
>> Yes, yes. Because people are utterly incapable of performing
>>those roles without dedicating their entire life and religious
>>experience to that role to get good magic. No, not buying it.
>
>Shit, you can do housework and childcare without belonging to Nandan
>or Ernalda or whoever.

	Yes. Exactly.
	And hey, if a man (not a Nandani, and one 
that isn't all that excited about progressing magically) doesn't mind doing a bit of housework and childcare, then he might not mind hooking with a woman who wasn't so good at those things (but had other talents, like swinging a sword). You never know.

>That's the thing that drives this - the Divine Magic. You want to hit
>somebody with a sword - you don't need to belong to a War Cult to do
>that. Use common magic or spirit magic or whatever it is called in
>whatever rules system you are using.

        And no one is disagreeing - the
inconsistency here comes in dumping additional restriction on to certain cults beyond the rest of Orlanthi society.

	Cheers
		David

*the neologism is a feminist blogocracy in-joke. You'll pick up the usage of it I'm sure.            

Powered by hypermail