(08-01-2015, 05:33 PM)hauntmedoitagain Wrote: Eorzea is not a conservative place outside of racial issues, though.
Twelveswood, La Noscea and Thanalan? All ruled by competent women. Limsa has a notable lesbian pirate bar. One of the most beloved side quests involves a crossdressing detective and many others feature openly LGBT characters.
We're dealing with a sexually liberated game world with racial conflict holdovers. To consider Hydaelyn more liberal than our own planet understates the matter greatly.
If you want to try and justify IC racism that's fine, but please, at least try to do it from a logical perspective.
Equating real world "conservatism" with conservatism in a culture is a bit silly.
Nanamo is ruler of Ul'dah because she's the only direct heir to the throne. Â Not because she's competent, not because she's good what what she does, but because she has the right bloodline and there were no direct male heirs in her way.
Kan-E-Senna is the ruling face of Gridania because she is the Elder Seedseer. Â She's Padjal. Â If she were an otherwise competent Hearer of Hyur or Elezen birth, she'd never be able to rise to that position - period. Â Because the only thing that matters is that she's Padjal. Â And sure, yes, she ostensibly possesses the requisite parts of a woman, but since Padjal never go through puberty, they ostensibly never have sex/children/etc. Â So the division between male and female (and the fact that a female Padjal would have 0 value in a marriage alliance) is likely non-existent. Â Because, effectively, male and female Padjal are the same - they're outside of gender roles within their community.
Ul'dah is ruled by a female, yet within Ul'dah we see case after case of women being treated effectively like chattel when it comes to marriage alliances. Â There's the storyline you follow as a Weaver. Â There's also the storyline in the Hildebrand questline wherein the girl is being married off to someone she doesn't know or love, and has little inclination to marry.
We have evidence of sex slavery in Limsa Lominsa (hello Sastasha), and while it is ruled by a complete badass of a woman, that doesn't mean that somehow Limsan society is "enlightened." It just means Merlwyb (sp?) is badass enough to kill anyone who gives her shit about being a woman.
And don't get me started about Ishgard...hoo boy.
Edited to Add: And for clarification, what I mean by "attempting to equate real world "conservatism" with conservatism in a culture is...this has nothing to do with modern day politics or political talking points. Cultures are by nature conservative. They want to remain as they are. They cling to values that have sustained them when they encounter different cultures. This is how cultures work.
In the context of Eorzea, we have a lot of very traditional (from our world perspective) behavior mixed with very liberal (again, from our world behavior) mores and values. Xenophobia actually makes perfect sense when outsiders are constantly causing the forest to eat people. Xenophobia makes sense when you are living in a meritocracy that values gold and success over all else, and every newcomer is a potential threat. Xenophobia makes sense when you are part of an embattled religion that believes that any difference of opinion or thought is heresy, and will thus bring down your entire civilization. The only city that isn't really xenophobic or necessarily racist is Limsa Lominsa, but it's also a city founded by pirates of all races. So..yeah.
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