Is Skyrim too politically correct?

[FiftyTifty]

I'll just throw this in;

 

The weakest male is stronger than the weakest female. The strongest male is stronger than the strongest female. There is, however, a gigantic range between these extremes. Anywhere from Stephen Hawking to Bruce Lee, there will be people of all genders with varying physical prowess.

 

Much like size with spiders; the largest females are larger than the largest males, and the smallest females are larger than the smallest males. You still find plenty of large male spiders and tiny female spiders.

Edited November 19, 2013 by FiftyTifty

[chanchan05]

Maybe it's just me, but aren't the Nords sort of loosely based on Scandinavian/Viking culture? Historically there are reports of fierce female vikings right? And that when you look into their mythos, there are plenty of 'strong' women.

[MrDave]

One thing that has always irked me a little bit about Skyrim is how it seems to try so hard to be as PC as possible. Now for example I'm not against females being warriors, (I do have female characters) but it seems a bit ridiculous to me that there are so many of them. It also seems silly to me that in a medieval age that women would be doing hard jobs like blacksmithing and manual labour and that there aren't more traditional women in the game. It seems that every female character is trying to prove that they can be just as good as men in all manly tasks and like Bethesda are trying to please feminists as much possible. I guess I can't fault Bethesda that much, they created the character Jarl Ulfric, but they even call you a foreigner when you play as a Nord which is really stupid. It would be cool if there were some kind of mod to make Skyrim less politically correct, but making entirely new dialogues would be pretty tough without the original voice actors.

 

Any thoughts?

Actually, if you look back throughout history, women frequently had the same roles as men. There were many Viking leaders who were women. There are several accounts of women defending castles throughout Europe and households in Japan. So, yeah... life back then was pretty equal opportunity by necessity. But just like most anything, we only get to hear about a few of them in the mainstream world, such as Joan de Arc.

[MidevalGuy]

Joan de Arc.

 

Burned at the stake and a virgin.

 

Great feminist role model ;)

[erikolaix]

My favorite games aside from Skyrim are Gothic I-II by Piranha Bytes, as well as S.T.A.L.K.E.R. by GSC Game World, and their lack of political correctness (including their realistic portrayal of gender roles) is part of the reason why. It makes them feel very authentic and immersive in a way that more politically correct games don't, and it's refereshing not to to feel as though you're being subjected to propaganda. I do think Skyrim is a touch too politically correct in the sense of gender roles, but I don't let it bother me, and if it does start bothering me I can adjust it by means of a mod. After all, we're free to make all kinds of politically incorrect mods. In example, if I want to make female warriors significantly weaker than their male counterparts, and make them occasionally break down and cry because they can't bear the psychological stress of battle, the Creation Kit allows me to do so.

 

I don't really want to criticize Skyrim for being too politically correct though, because Bethesda were very bold in presenting a faction such as the Stormcloaks in an arguably positive light. The Stormcloaks are traditionalist nationalists who want to preserve their own people and culture, they're openly discriminatory against immigrants, and they have a male-dominated leadership, i.e. they're a very politically incorrect. Their real-life equivalent would be referred to as 'right-wing extremist', and in most other American RPGs such a faction would have been portrayed as villanous and antagonistic.

Edited November 20, 2013 by eriknm

[calfurius]

I'm sorry but what..? This is a completely different universe. While Skyrim and the TES series shares similiaries with our real life culture, how relations between race and gender work out ARE NOT THE SAME AS THE WAY THEY WORK HERE IN THE REAL WORLD. I mean you have freaking Giants and Mammoths walking across Skyrim and a culture who's dead has a tendency to come back to life as Draugr (aka MUMMIES) when their buried in tombs. You really want to apply the history and culture of something as complex as gender role to this type of universe? What the hell?

 

 

TES games aren't PC, the world Betheseda presents is the world the game should be. All this bulls*** about "their shouldn't be that many female warriors!" falls flat when you realize that none of the races in Skyrim are even the same BREED of humans as the one in real life. I mean racial differences in real life are minimum. Their are actual REAL racial differences in the TES universe, even among the humans. Nords are stronger then Imperials, Bretons are more magically attuned then Nords, Imperials are a balance between the two with them being better at socializing and diplomacy. So the gender differences in TES games are more then likely to be different then the ones in real life. I mean Bosmer women are taller then Bosmer men is an example of this.

 

These distinct racial differences don't exist in real life among Blacks, White, Asians, etc. The differences are based more on different culture and geographic differences then actual innate differences.

Edited November 21, 2013 by calfurius

[katling]

In regards to the comment about there not being many examples of female soldiers/warriors throughout history? That's only because you're not looking hard enough and that the history books for a long time were largely written by men. Here is a website listing a rather large number of either individual women or example of groups of women who trained as soldiers or lead armies or otherwise fought in battles, jousts and wars from 3500BC until the 20th century - http://www.lothene.org/others/women.html

 

I'm particularly fond of Agnes Hotot who, when her father fell ill on the eve of a joust to settle a quarrel, put on helmet and armour to disguise her sex, took her father's horse and lance and proceeded to defeat her opponent in the joust and when she was done, she took off her helmet and "disclosed her bosom" so that he would know he had been defeated by a woman. So apparently a woman was perfectly capable of jousting as well as a man which kind of blows a hole in your argument that women are too weak to fight against men. Agnes did it and won quite handily. And showed off her boobs afterwards. As you do.

[cfguy]

MOAR Necro:

I agree IRL there likely wouldn't be many lumber mill workers or blacksmiths as females, but while they were less common, Vikings did have "shield maidens" who were relatively adept at fighting. Again, it's stupid to argue physical strength between men and women (no contest overall), but strength isn't the only thing when it comes to fighting. In Viking culture, women actually ran the estates too and took care of the land when the men were off trading or (in rarer cases, contrary to popular belief) raiding, giving women a decent amount of power/equality in society (they controlled finances). Equality in society and in marriages were far more common in Scandinavian history and came about faaaar sooner than in "Western" culture. Many women hunted too.

 

Overall, I don't mind in Skyrim as I think it's a relatively feasible representation of Scandinavian culture (obviously fantasy though). Minus a few things here and there (nothing wrong with managing a mill however), I wouldn't say it's overly PC.

 

 

 

Rant: One thing that does bug me (as an aside) in fantasy in general though is how only women seem to be archers (not usually an Elder Scrolls problem). Always some 90-lb elf chick drawing a warbow.

In reality, warbows drew somewhere between 120-200lbs, depending on culture. Hunting bows were much lighter, but warbows were extremely heavy. I'm 6'2, 187lbs and weightlift regularly - I shoot a 54lb longbow which I can decently control (without any fatigure) from about 70-100 shots, depending on how often I practice. A 150lb bow is HEAVY, and I'm sorry but unless you're really well practiced from childhood, chances are you won't be shooting a warbow that often as the tiny supermodels they portray.

[calfurius]

@cfguy

 

A lot of fantasy games are pretty unrealistic, I mean the way players handle their swords is better then in most fantasy games, but the stances are still pretty messy. Don't even get started on the concept of 2 handed and duel wielding weapons. 2 handed weapons weren't carried from place to place, they were given to soldiers at the start of a battle. Walking around with a great sword or great axe strapped your back is pretty unrealistic.

 

But hey we forgive this because of Willing Suspension of Disbelief and the Rule of Fun.

Edited November 22, 2013 by calfurius

[Oubliette]

A case could be made that Skyrim is rather too politically correct. It's a game set in a world with rampant racism and yet I can still gain service from any NPC as any race and likely will not be stoned or arrested so long as I'm not killing people in the street or stealing very badly. However I don't really think there's much to discuss about female stereotypical roles in the game that's just flamebait waiting for a match imho.