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@terdon Mostly there was a portion in the middle of book four that suddenly went on an angry, one-sided opinion piece on feminism. And they made Ged weak enough that he couldn't be celibate without a binding spell?! How is that not downgrading a character?

ArtOfCode

→ 12 messages moved to Chimney

Rubiksmoose

> couldn't be celibate without a binding spell?!

You know, as one does.

I certainly couldn't.

At least not before my mid thirties at any rate, and I wouldn't bet on me since either!

Well, it's not like that!

6:03 PM

Hang on though. What, exactly, did the binding spell, well, bind?

And to what was it bound?

This is starting to sound horrible!

He spoiler alert! at the end of book three, and he doesn't have the spell on him anymore. He's 50. He arrives at the female protagonist's house, and immediately wants her?

@terdon Haha that's GoT, not Earthsea

Rubiksmoose

@terdon ಠ_ಠ

true, my bad :P

I certainly don't mind strong female characters that do stuff. If, instead, you're in a competition wondering and trying to show at every turn that you can do better than men, haven't you already started with the assumption that you might be inferior?

@M.A.R. Not necessarily. You may well have started with the assumption that you are superior, but you also know that all the men around you will have started with the assumption that you are inferior.

6:06 PM

So that's what male protagonists don't do. They don't start with what they are, they start with what they do and why they're a great person worthy of respect.

I wonder how many of the female protagonists you are thinking of were written by men.

Of a certain age and a certain generation.

@terdon Arguably equally wrong, but if it was that, you wouldn't need to prove to yourself throughout the darn movie or book that it's not the case

Sadly, too many women have to do just that kind of proving to themselves and others for their entire lives.

When everyone you encounter immediately assumes your inadequacy, I can understand how proving them wrong can become central to your character.

@terdon A few, I dunno. So I've been trying to be more observant about this stuff, and it's more common than I've thought, thankfully. But when I'm trying to think of examples, I fail mostly

@terdon But when it's all you do, that's all people will remember you for.

So the greatness comes from moving on and doing something recognizable instead? I'm mostly annoyed by the passive aggressive attitude, acting like you're owed attention, while not contributing much to anything.

And I actually know for a fact that these female characters were written by men.

Sounds like it, yes.

Do try reading the Broken Earth series mentioned above. They're particularly good on this specific front.

6:15 PM

Like female characters that are mostly only healers or love interests, they might say something mean some time as a statement of "look we're hip and stuff", and they might or might not appear in a single point in the plot to save the hero or something. All the other times, step aside, the bulky handsome hero is trying to save the world and stuff.

@terdon Ooh, multiple Hugos. Interesting

I hope literary awards aren't politicized and positively discriminating

Rob

Oops darn touchscreen keyboard, undo that.

@M.A.R. Well, the Broken Earth does have a female protagonist who is a healer and a love interest to someone, but she's also one hell of a badass, a very well rounded character, flawed, grieving, with regrets and intelligence and capable of great compassion.

As well as destruction.

Well that's exactly what I'm talking about. A character that does things, not talk about what rights they're owed all the time or "y u neglect me". Well, lady, it might be because you blend into the background until the next time you can assert female characters are cool.

What I liked about Ged was that he was probably the first and the first memorable teenage (and subsequently young) character I read that wasn't ruled by selfish self-centered mood swings of puberty or hunting down a girlfriend. It was rather refreshing.

I should remove one of those adjectives. One is redundant. Meh

7:02 PM

@terdon not sure it's smart to bring it back to the room, but I want to share my two cents on this. At first I had the same impression of "what's wrong with it, it's not a direct abuse", but then after reading the comments (on Twitter) and re-thinking this, came to different conclusion.

1) the kid is 8 years old. That's not so young anymore, and on the brink of adolescence. He might see nudity as something sexual already, not the naive way young kids see it.

2) this should have been kept private. Nudists are good example: they can be nude in their own home, or public places meant for that, but sharing their nudist activity with the outside world isn't OK.

That's about it, and worth to mention that personally I have no problem with nudity, but I also follow rules and accepted behaviors. :)

@ShadowWizardWearingMask It isn't, @JohnDvorak asked us to drop it as it was making him feel uncomfortable.

John Dvorak

Don't worry, I've already left anyways

Mithical

@JohnDvorak I'm right.

....wait

@DavidPostill saw just that the pic made him uncomfortable, didn't notice he meant the whole discussion.

@Mithical better than small.

7:19 PM

Talking of masks ...

Who?

taking mask off while talking

@ShadowWizardWearingMask You are so impatient :)

Copy first, paste later! ;)

@DavidPostill who.... Is that? (on mobile, no reverse search... 😳)

I have a very slow connection :/

Oh wait there is!

Can swear there wasn't a while ago when I last checked..

7:22 PM

@ShadowWizardWearingMask Me :) Masked ball in 2007

@DavidPostill oh wow, nice!

@DavidPostill nah it's imgur fault, even 1kb pic will take long time to upload.

Well Google just identify it as mask, no pages contain that pic.

Where was it? @David

@ShadowWizardWearingMask Nowhere famous. Just a party in Dorset.

Thinking back, I never put actual mask as an adult. Until the Corona, where I was forced to do it.

Rob

7:49 PM

It's true, The Shadow never wears a mask, just glasses.

Sonic the Masked Werehog

8:36 PM

Shadow mask

The shadow mask is one of the two technologies used in the manufacture of cathode-ray tube (CRT) televisions and computer monitors which produce clear, focused color images. The other approach is the aperture grille, better known by its trade name, Trinitron. All early color televisions and the majority of CRT computer monitors used shadow mask technology. Both of these technologies are largely obsolete, having been increasingly replaced since the 1990s by the liquid-crystal display (LCD). A shadow mask is a metal plate punched with tiny holes that separate the colored phosphors in the layer behind...