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+--- Thread: How privileged is your character? (/showthread.php?tid=12411)
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RE: How privileged is your character? - Blue - 07-04-2015
(07-04-2015, 07:45 PM)Shuck Wrote:(07-04-2015, 07:44 PM)Blue Wrote: Okay, you don't have to participate and I respect your view, as Evelyn Beatrice Hall would say: «I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it»
I'd kindly ask that you do the same and not tell me to just "drop it". I'll leave the rest in the hands of the mods. I am content with having read even just one bit of information about one's character status in society (thank you Kellach) and polite feedback on how to improve the questions (thank you Vodka). My mind is at peace.
I'm not telling you to do anything. I can't. I'm asking you questions regarding your approach here.
Okay, give me a bit to try and address them, then. I am not comparing Eorzea to the third world, I was merely saying that education is considered a privilege even where illiteracy is fairly uncommon, you are privileged if you can read. I think for example that Garlemald is fairly literate, as is Sharlayan. Eorzea is clearly not in a first world environment, it is still in development compared to some other countries (hence, they can't be "first", and there's also internal conflicts going on, which are often counted in when determining the position of a nation, or group of nations, in the world ranking. I'd put it in the second world setting, which is equiparable to Russia of the modern days).
Regarding faith, maybe there is not discord among different believers of the Twelve.. this is more treated as Greece's pantheon of the Gods, where one will preach a deity more than the other depending on his trade or status. But we should not forget that we just received a huge batch of RPers that do not preach the Twelve (the Au Ra), and there's also the Garleans. My character, Clive, is an Ala Mhigan, grown in the invaded city. He was beated hard to drop his worshiping of the Twelve, so much that he now sides with the Garleans' point of view on religion (I think they are atheists?).
Also, I do not think all trades in Eorzea accept pretty much anyone. There can be cases of frowned upon communities undertaking certain jobs.
2.1 Spoilers
At the archer's guild you are also dissed initially for not being fit the class. The archery questline in general is all about cultural traditions on bowsmanship between the Keepers of the Moon and the ... whatever clan that Elezen was.
So yes, there are examples of discrimination on trades, as well.
RE: How privileged is your character? - Domri Blackblade - 07-04-2015
![[Image: mean-girls-18.gif]](http://screencrush.com/files/2013/04/mean-girls-18.gif)
RE: How privileged is your character? - Max - 07-04-2015
Whenever I see a Monetarist not check their privilege I am so literally triggered.
RE: How privileged is your character? - Warren Castille - 07-04-2015
Quote: If you were born in one of the main City-States (Limsa Lominsa, Gridania, Ul'dah, Ishgard), take one step forward.
The folks in the Brume would like to know how being born in Ishgard equates to having gained privilege.
I don't want to be yet another person jumping on the "Maybe this isn't a good idea..." wagon, but applying real-world social dynamics to a medievalish fantasy setting doesn't seem compatible.
RE: How privileged is your character? - McBeefâ„¢ - 07-04-2015
I mean I get what you're trying to do in theory, but in practice this is RP, and you can make a character as high or as low as you wish.
You can decide tomorrow that your character suddenly got wealthy, or they could lose it all. I would almost argue this does a disservice to real life discussions of privilege, by implying it also could be personal choice.
Edit: Yay it's the thread derailment brigade. Glad to see you have joined us, I was worried we might for once have a calm discussion about a controversial subject..
RE: How privileged is your character? - Virella - 07-04-2015
Checking your privilege just does not work in Eorzea. It does not have privileges in the way the real world has; every tribe, society, nation considers x to be something privileged, or not.
Heck in your previous questions, I had a laughing fit over "is English take your native language? Take a step back." & "If you are not American, take a step back." due to being Dutch. Privileges in real life are still very relative.
If you wanted to do this in a way it would work, you would have to do it for every nation and society. But I am very much on the bandwagon as well this will lead to nothing in the end.
RE: How privileged is your character? - Uther - 07-04-2015
(07-04-2015, 08:03 PM)Warren Castille Wrote: I don't want to be yet another person jumping on the "Maybe this isn't a good idea..." wagon, but applying real-world social dynamics to a medievalish fantasy setting doesn't seem compatible.
Welcome to the wagon. I'm not against it for anything other than the objective reason of "2015 America and the world of Hydaelyn are entirely incomparable for these purposes"
I get what OP's trying to do. It's cool to try to involve everyone in a big intensive character survey, and the frustration at all the pushback is understandable.
But this doesn't work. Sorry, man. Plus the idea of "privilege" is a hot-button issue in society right now, so it's probably not wise to throw it into this make believe world we all play pretend in. It's a little too real for some people.
Plus, how the hell am I supposed to gauge my character's privilege? His circumstances are entirely unlike my own, or anyone's, for that matter. Gauge Tarzan's privilege and get back to me with what you find. If that works, I'll give Tancred's a shot.
RE: How privileged is your character? - McBeefâ„¢ - 07-04-2015
(07-04-2015, 08:06 PM)Virella Douront Wrote: Checking your privilege just does not work in Eorzea. It does not have privileges in the way the real world has; everyone tribe, society, nation considers x to be something privileged, or not.
Heck in your previous questions, I had a laughing fit over "is English take your native language? Take a step back." & "If you are not American, take a step back." due to being Dutch. Privileges in real life are still very relative.
If you wanted to do this in a way it would work, you would have to do it for every nation and society. But I am very much on the bandwagon as well this will lead to nothing in the end.
Even with it done for cities, there would be so many assumptions and generalizations made, I doubt it would tell you anything useful.
That's the issue with those 'privilege tests' in the real world as well, it tells you more about the intentions and views of the test-maker, than it does anything about actual privilege.
Privilege is best when just left as a concept, and a way to express the idea that there are not obvious resources people can have due to their race, birth, nationality, family, etc. It breaks apart when you try to score it like stats in an RPG.
edit: bolded for emphasis.
RE: How privileged is your character? - Shuck - 07-04-2015
(07-04-2015, 07:59 PM)Blue Wrote: Okay, give me a bit to try and address them, then. I am not comparing Eorzea to the third world, I was merely saying that education is considered a privilege even where illiteracy is fairly uncommon, you are privileged if you can read. I think for example that Garlemald is fairly literate, as is Sharlayan. Eorzea is clearly not in a first world environment, it is still in development compared to some other countries (hence, they can't be "first", and there's also internal conflicts going on, which are often counted in when determining the position of a nation, or group of nations, in the world ranking. I'd put it in the second world setting, which is equiparable to Russia of the modern days).
That's the problem. You think. We have no way of knowing. That information isn't in the game. You can't establish a metric of any sort without context, and we are lacking context. We have no idea what the official literacy rate is. We have no idea how necessary it is, given what we see of Eorzean society.
We have no idea how satisfied people are with their governments, or their lot in life, or their way of living. We have no idea how the nobility and common people interact, if at all. We have no idea how well, or how poorly Garlemald is doing. We know nothing about Sharlayan outside of "has scholars". In what? For what? Are they like Ishgard's observatory staff? Are they like the Ossuary? The seedseers? Entirely different in general? What is our measure of education?
(07-04-2015, 07:59 PM)Blue Wrote: Regarding faith, maybe there is not discord among different believers of the Twelve.. this is more treated as Greece's pantheon of the Gods, where one will preach a deity more than the other depending on his trade or status. But we should not forget that we just received a huge batch of RPers that do not preach the Twelve (the Au Ra), and there's also the Garleans. My character, Clive, is an Ala Mhigan, grown in the invaded city. He was beated hard to drop his worshiping of the Twelve, so much that he now sides with the Garleans' point of view on religion (I think they are atheists?).
There's nothing that suggests Garleans are atheists. They simply don't believe that the Primals are gods. We also have no idea what the Au Ra believe. We have no idea how that sits with people that worship the twelve.
We also have no real indication of how Gridania deals with the Elementals Vs. The Twelve.
(07-04-2015, 07:59 PM)Blue Wrote: Also, I do not think all trades in Eorzea accept pretty much anyone. There can be cases of frowned upon communities undertaking certain jobs.
2.1 Spoilers
At the archer's guild you are also dissed initially for not being fit the class. The archery questline in general is all about cultural traditions on bowsmanship between the Keepers of the Moon and the ... whatever clan that Elezen was.
So yes, there are examples of discrimination on trades, as well.
"Frowned upon" doesn't really say much, though. Before a high-horse is mounted, and I'm told that because I disagree with you, I have no idea what discrimination could possibly be like, let me say the following: I'm brown, and jewish. I've applied to jobs that would not call me back until I checked "prefer not to answer" in the race column.
"Frowned upon" means jack shit if they don't turn you away. And they don't. At all. Ever.
Anyway. Even though this NPC is a real dick to the player character, that dickery extends even if the player character is of the same race they are. It's got less to do with the character's race, and more to do with the NPC's opinion of themself.
On the spoilered text: Nobody likes refugees, period. Anywhere. At all. "Not being at war" isn't a privilege, it's the default state of things.
On questions: So how are we handling a simple lack of jobs for these people, then? What happens when we've got enough help? Is blind, dumb luck a privilege? How do we measure that?
What about the acceptance of a myriad of societies regarding their rulers? Are the seedseers privileged? Because game world context suggests that it's a burden.
In a world where death due to disease and injury is a pretty common fact of life, do you really think anyone's going to shout "ableism" if a call is put out to all able bodied people to keep the town from being burnt by whatever apocalypse rolls up the road this week?
Again, where is your information coming from? What context are you placing these questions in? We're lacking in any meaningful information here. Also, I'm still not telling you to drop it. I'm saying that in order to get this down, you'd need to know more about the world than we're actually able to know, given the big, gaping blindspots in the lore, and the amount of guessing you'd have to do to adapt this concept to the setting.
RE: How privileged is your character? - Faye - 07-04-2015
what
is this tumblr
is this real life
is this Eorzea
RE: How privileged is your character? - McBeefâ„¢ - 07-04-2015
If people could just shut the fuck up and leave a thread alone if they're going to just spam passive aggressive image macro's and snarky comments RPC would be a far better place.
You're not being funny, you're just ruining the community.
RE: How privileged is your character? - Edda - 07-04-2015
Perhaps less of a focus on privilege, and maybe more: "How easy is/was your character's life?" I'm not really one to beat a dead horse over the fact that real world privileges are difficult if not impossible to apply to Eorzea, but there are certainly instances where a character would have a much rougher time than another (i.e. a Duskwight growing up in Gridania vs. a Wildwood).
RE: How privileged is your character? - Shuck - 07-04-2015
(07-04-2015, 08:15 PM)Edda Wrote: Perhaps less of a focus on privilege, and maybe more: "How easy is/was your character's life?" I'm not really one to beat a dead horse over the fact that real world privileges are difficult if not impossible to apply to Eorzea, but there are certainly instances where a character would have a much rougher time than another (i.e. a Duskwight growing up in Gridania vs. a Wildwood).
Absolutely true here. This is a great example of something observable, that we have a clear measure of. The relative wealth of your average family is...well. Not. We have no idea. We don't even see families like, anywhere. All NPC's are either quest givers, part of a quest, or vendors. Some of them are flavor accessories that never move, or speak.
RE: How privileged is your character? - Nero - 07-04-2015
Right, we're not going to do this. There is very little chance of this discussion going in a civil direction, so this is being locked now.