Momo
Junior Member
Big meanie jerkface
Posts: 58 
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Post by Momo on Nov 27, 2013 4:10:15 GMT
You seem to be genuinely confusing bisexuality with polyamory. Bisexual = attracted equally to people of both genders, as opposed to being only attracted to a single gender. It in no way implies multiple partners. Polyamory = The opposite of monogamy. Actively seeking/engaging in relationships with more than one person at a time.
Polygamy is a similar term, but usually implies marriage is involved and a lot of people don't like to use it (at least in the USA) because it's been strongly (and unpleasantly) associated with certain sects of Mormonism and a very specific type of multiple-parter marriage.
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Post by Señor Goose on Nov 27, 2013 4:23:07 GMT
What is it with pink frilly things casting glamours? Last session our half orc sorcerer put on a pair of panties he found in the desert and suddenly became a buxom dwarf woman. If your half-orc sorcerer is just slapping on any ol' pair of panties he finds laying around in dangerous areas, there may be bigger questions about the situation you should be asking yourself.  Look at you two.  |
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Post by warrl on Nov 27, 2013 4:24:16 GMT
You seem to be genuinely confusing bisexuality with polyamory. Nope, I am "confusing" ACTIVE bisexuality - where one actually has sexual partners of both genders - with a choice of either serial polygamy or polyamory. Neither of which is monogamy. |
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Post by SerenaJo on Nov 27, 2013 4:30:50 GMT
You seem to be genuinely confusing bisexuality with polyamory. Nope, I am "confusing" ACTIVE bisexuality - where one actually has sexual partners of both genders - with a choice of either serial polygamy or polyamory. Neither of which is monogamy. I think the problem is that polygamy is not an inherent quality of bisexuality, and "active bisexual" kind of implies that. Maybe "polyamorous bisexual" would be simpler? |
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Post by The Anarch on Nov 27, 2013 4:30:54 GMT
Admittedly I may be wrong here, but I'm pretty sure sexuality - be it hetero, homo, bi, or otherwise - is a state of being and/or preference, not something you actually do. I don't go out and heterosexual on all the fine ladies every Friday night*. And it would seem to me that viewing sexuality as something that has to be acted upon to exist is kind of suspect. I'm not having sex right this second. I'm not even feeling attraction toward another person at the moment (despite the fact that sex is all guys are supposedly thinking about). Does this mean that I am asexual rather than heterosexual right now? * Or do I?  |
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Momo
Junior Member
Big meanie jerkface
Posts: 58
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Post by Momo on Nov 27, 2013 4:34:42 GMT
You seem to be genuinely confusing bisexuality with polyamory. Nope, I am "confusing" ACTIVE bisexuality - where one actually has sexual partners of both genders - with a choice of either serial polygamy or polyamory. Neither of which is monogamy. Dude, "active bisexual" is not a real term no matter how many times you say it. Bisexual = attracted to both genders. Homosexual = attracted only to your own gender. Heterosexual = attracted only to the opposite gender. + Monogamous = has an exclusive relationship with one partner at a time. Polyamorous = has relationships with multiple partners at a time. Those are how those terms work (there are other degrees of sexuality, ie: asexual, pansexual. But I'm simplifying here for the sake of the point). One can be bisexual and monogamous, or heterosexual and polyamorous, or any combination therein. The word bisexual has no implication of multiple partners, even if you stick "active" in front of it to try and make your own term. Frankly it just makes me think of a bunch of bisexuals on exercise bikes. If your half-orc sorcerer is just slapping on any ol' pair of panties he finds laying around in dangerous areas, there may be bigger questions about the situation you should be asking yourself. Look at you two. This whole line of conversation is making me really sad we're not having a session this week due to everyone being away for the holiday. I play with awesome people. |
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Post by SerenaJo on Nov 27, 2013 4:34:43 GMT
And it would seem to me that viewing sexuality as something that has to be acted upon to exist is kind of suspect. YES thank you |
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Post by Daedalus on Nov 27, 2013 4:42:01 GMT
And it would seem to me that viewing sexuality as something that has to be acted upon to exist is kind of suspect. YES thank you This fits your avatar pic well  |
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Post by Deleted on Nov 27, 2013 4:43:57 GMT
I see some discussion on the earlier pages about whether the headband was about Kat being gay, and I want to definitely say that of course it was. She started wearing it right after the events of Faraway Morning. Her dialogue with Zimmy in Divine couldn't have been about anything except for Kat's sexuality. There had been no references to Kat being socially isolated for ages, but her conversation with Paz had come only a few pages before. That, along with her reaction to Rey's comment in chapter 35 during Robot and Parley's fight, definitively says that she was aware of her feelings about Paz and was also very insecure about them.
Just to respond to the thread's topic, I think it's great, though I do have one reservation. I've seen a few posts in this thread saying that gays are underrepresented in the media, but Tom's doing more than representing them. If you want to count Zimmy and Gamma, which is debatable, I know, Tom's got three gay couples going, all of which are basically regulars. Gays statistically make up about 10% of the population, but Gunnerkrigg's got it up near 50%. I'm not homophobic, I think having gay characters is great, and I can't even handle how cute Kat and Paz are, but just like the media underrepresents gays, Tom's overdoing it. It should be realistic.
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Post by The Anarch on Nov 27, 2013 4:48:35 GMT
Gays statistically make up about 10% of the population, but Gunnerkrigg's got it up near 50%. Wow, I knew the population of the Court was pretty small, but I didn't think it was just 12 people running around. |
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Momo
Junior Member
Big meanie jerkface
Posts: 58
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Post by Momo on Nov 27, 2013 4:52:56 GMT
Gays statistically make up about 10% of the population, but Gunnerkrigg's got it up near 50%. Wow, I knew the population of the Court was pretty small, but I didn't think it was just 12 people running around. The rest are just robots/figments of everyone's imagination. Scratch that, the entire story is taking place inside Annie's head. NOBODY IS REAL. Also I will never cease to chuckle mightily when people try to make the "need to keep it realistic" when it comes to gayness in a fantasy story. Everyone could be gay and the entire human species now reproduces through osmosis and it wouldn't be any less realistic than half of what goes on in this comic. |
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Post by Deleted on Nov 27, 2013 4:54:52 GMT
Gays statistically make up about 10% of the population, but Gunnerkrigg's got it up near 50%. Wow, I knew the population of the Court was pretty small, but I didn't think it was just 12 people running around. Gunnerkrigg's main cast isn't much more than 12 people, though, and those are the characters whose sexuality we're generally aware of. Gay: Kat, Paz, Robot, Shadow, Zimmy, Gamma Straight: Annie, Jack, Andrew, Parley, Anja, Donald, Eglamore If you're going to count Zimmy and Gamma as being in a relationship, that's 50%. So unless the main c ast has a much higher concentration of gay people than the rest of the course, which is statistically improbable, half of the court is gay. Tom's just making it unrealistic, which feels dangerously like him preaching at us, which I don't like, no matter what's being preached. And hell, that's counting Jack as a main character when he's really little more than recurring. (I am just counting humans, of course, as those are relevant to the statistics while gods and magical creatures are not). |
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Post by The Anarch on Nov 27, 2013 4:57:40 GMT
Also I will never cease to chuckle mightily when people try to make the "need to keep it realistic" when it comes to gayness in a fantasy story. And even if we were to apply realism to this one aspect, though 10% of the entire human population is indeed quite a low number relatively speaking, it isn't as if that 10% is evenly spread out across the entire world. There are gay communities which, when taken completely on their own, show a very high percentage of homosexuals and very low percentage of heterosexuals living there, for example. A clumping of homosexual individuals and couples within a single area, whether by design or by accident, is not necessarily unrealistic. |
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Post by Señor Goose on Nov 27, 2013 4:57:46 GMT
Wow, I knew the population of the Court was pretty small, but I didn't think it was just 12 people running around. Gunnerkrigg's main cast isn't much more than 12 people, though, and those are the characters whose sexuality we're generally aware of. Gay: Kat, Paz, Robot, Shadow, Zimmy, Gamma Straight: Annie, Jack, Andrew, Parley, Anja, Donald, Eglamore If you're going to count Zimmy and Gamma as being in a relationship, that's 50%. So unless the main c ast has a much higher concentration of gay people than the rest of the course, which is statistically improbable, half of the court is gay. Tom's just making it unrealistic, which feels dangerously like him preaching at us, which I don't like, no matter what's being preached. And hell, that's counting Jack as a main character when he's really little more than recurring. (I am just counting humans, of course, as those are relevant to the statistics while gods and magical creatures are not). I am really not sure Gamma and Zimmy are together in that way. I think it's a dependent relationship, very intimate, but I doubt there's real romance going on. |
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Post by warrl on Nov 27, 2013 5:00:08 GMT
Dude, "active bisexual" is not a real term no matter how many times you say it. Thank you for the list of definitions I already knew, understood, and have not disputed. I gave a very precise definition of what I meant by one term I used that was not on your list and is not a synonym for anything on your list. That makes it a real term at least within the context of my posts on this thread. I used that term more than once because several people apparently did not recognize the meaning I thought was obvious, so I wanted to explain my meaning. But I didn't want to add to the confusion by changing terminology. It seems to me that you are trying to invalidate that term and throw out a critical part of the definition I gave so that you can object to my saying something rather different from what I actually said. I don't really appreciate that. It also seems to me that you think I am in some way condemning active bisexuals, or perhaps bisexuals in general, or some other group. If so, you are mistaken. I was describing, not endorsing, an attitude I see in our society. (It's possible I stated things badly. I don't see where I did, but people do have an unfortunate tendency when reading their own writing to see what they intended to write rather than what they actually did write.) |
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Post by Deleted on Nov 27, 2013 5:00:32 GMT
Gunnerkrigg's main cast isn't much more than 12 people, though, and those are the characters whose sexuality we're generally aware of. Gay: Kat, Paz, Robot, Shadow, Zimmy, Gamma Straight: Annie, Jack, Andrew, Parley, Anja, Donald, Eglamore If you're going to count Zimmy and Gamma as being in a relationship, that's 50%. So unless the main c ast has a much higher concentration of gay people than the rest of the course, which is statistically improbable, half of the court is gay. Tom's just making it unrealistic, which feels dangerously like him preaching at us, which I don't like, no matter what's being preached. And hell, that's counting Jack as a main character when he's really little more than recurring. (I am just counting humans, of course, as those are relevant to the statistics while gods and magical creatures are not). I am really not sure Gamma and Zimmy are together in that way. I think it's a dependent relationship, very intimate, but I doubt there's real romance going on. I tend to agree, I really just brought them up to support my agenda (I'd make a good politician). Annie's conversation with Jack in Faraway Morning kind of implied that, though I wish there'd be something a bit more definitive to shut up all the people who claim they're romantic. |
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Post by Deleted on Nov 27, 2013 5:03:29 GMT
Also I will never cease to chuckle mightily when people try to make the "need to keep it realistic" when it comes to gayness in a fantasy story. These are human beings though that act like real humans. The people in Harry Potter are realistic humans. The people in Lord of the Rings are realistic humans. The people in Gunnerkrigg Court are also realistic humans. As such, they should conform to realistic statistics, i.e. roughly 10% of the characters being gay. |
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Post by sapientcoffee on Nov 27, 2013 5:06:30 GMT
Maybe 10% of all possible characters are gay, we're just seeing the characters that Annie and Kat are around and of those, the percentage is higher than 10.
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Post by The Anarch on Nov 27, 2013 5:08:07 GMT
Wow, I knew the population of the Court was pretty small, but I didn't think it was just 12 people running around. Gunnerkrigg's main cast isn't much more than 12 people, though, and those are the characters whose sexuality we're generally aware of. [...] So unless the main cast has a much higher concentration of gay people than the rest of the course, which is statistically improbable, half of the court is gay. Twelve people is not a statistically significant enough amount from which to extrapolate that sort of data. Further, statistics that rely only on a segment of a population only indicate possible trends, they neither truly reflect or define reality. For all we know, the three core non-straight couples may be the only ones at all within the Court. It seems to me that you are basing your claims of unrealistic sexuality representation on incomplete and specious data. |
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Post by Deleted on Nov 27, 2013 5:09:09 GMT
Maybe 10% of all possible characters are gay, we're just seeing the characters that Annie and Kat are around and of those, the percentage is higher than 10. That's just mathematically improbable though. Possible, but improbable and obviously just Tom sticking in gay characters, which is fine, but feels like preaching when you get too many in there. |
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Post by Deleted on Nov 27, 2013 5:09:45 GMT
Gunnerkrigg's main cast isn't much more than 12 people, though, and those are the characters whose sexuality we're generally aware of. [...] So unless the main cast has a much higher concentration of gay people than the rest of the course, which is statistically improbable, half of the court is gay. Twelve people is not a statistically significant enough amount from which to extrapolate that sort of data. Further, statistics that rely only on a segment of a population only indicate possible trends, they neither truly reflect or define reality. For all we know, the three core non-straight couples may be the only ones at all within the Court. It seems to me that you are basing your claims of unrealistic sexuality representation on incomplete and specious data. Possible, but mathematically improbable. |
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Post by Daedalus on Nov 27, 2013 5:10:22 GMT
Wow, I knew the population of the Court was pretty small, but I didn't think it was just 12 people running around. Gunnerkrigg's main cast isn't much more than 12 people, though, and those are the characters whose sexuality we're generally aware of. Gay: Kat, Paz, Robot, Shadow, Zimmy, Gamma Straight: Annie, Jack, Andrew, Parley, Anja, Donald, Eglamore If you're going to count Zimmy and Gamma as being in a relationship, that's 50%. So unless the main c ast has a much higher concentration of gay people than the rest of the course, which is statistically improbable, half of the Court is gay. Ehhh, it's a small enough sample size that it's not that unlikely to have happened randomly: t-tests are fun. We could do a binomial distribution to check if you wanted. Plus, if you want to talk about other relationships that have been shown (outside of main cast), don't forget Margo/John, William/Janet, and Kat/Aly (if she is bisexual, as some people say, her relationships should fall under both categories). Plus Tony/Surma, of course. And Robot/Shadow is still open to debate. Interpreting it differently, that's 4 homosexual to 15 heterosexual. The most likely thing, as I see it, is that the story has tended to focus around a group of students that are slightly disproportionately gay in a universe that is pretty similar statistically to our own. Plus, in our universe (and presumably in the Gunnerverse), different age groups have vastly different statistics. Just saying we should not make a big deal of a small statistical anomaly. (EDIT: The Anarch already made this part of my comment.) |
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Post by The Anarch on Nov 27, 2013 5:11:27 GMT
Possible, but mathematically improbable. "Unlikely" and "unrealistic" are not the same thing. |
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Post by Deleted on Nov 27, 2013 5:13:40 GMT
Gunnerkrigg's main cast isn't much more than 12 people, though, and those are the characters whose sexuality we're generally aware of. Gay: Kat, Paz, Robot, Shadow, Zimmy, Gamma Straight: Annie, Jack, Andrew, Parley, Anja, Donald, Eglamore If you're going to count Zimmy and Gamma as being in a relationship, that's 50%. So unless the main c ast has a much higher concentration of gay people than the rest of the course, which is statistically improbable, half of the Court is gay. Ehhh, it's a small enough sample size that it's not that unlikely to have happened randomly: t-tests are fun. We could do a binomial distribution to check if you wanted. Plus, if you want to talk about other relationships that have been shown (outside of main cast), don't forget Margo/John, William/Janet, and Kat/Aly (if she is bisexual, as some people say, her relationships should fall under both categories). Plus Tony/Surma, of course. And Robot/Shadow is still open to debate. Interpreting it differently, that's 4 homosexual to 15 heterosexual. The most likely thing, as I see it, is that the story has tended to focus around a group of students that are slightly disproportionately gay in a universe that is pretty similar statistically to our own. Plus, in our universe (and presumably in the Gunnerverse), different age groups have vastly different statistics. Just saying we should not make a big deal of a small statistical anomaly. Fair, reasonable analysis. 9/10 would consider for a moment and then agree with again. Still, I think that only counting the central characters (i.e. not counting characters like Janet, Margo, and John), the gay to straight ratio is improbable. |
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Momo
Junior Member
Big meanie jerkface
Posts: 58
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Post by Momo on Nov 27, 2013 5:14:41 GMT
Dude, "active bisexual" is not a real term no matter how many times you say it. Thank you for the list of definitions I already knew, understood, and have not disputed. I gave a very precise definition of what I meant by one term I used that was not on your list and is not a synonym for anything on your list. That makes it a real term at least within the context of my posts on this thread. I used that term more than once because several people apparently did not recognize the meaning I thought was obvious, so I wanted to explain my meaning. But I didn't want to add to the confusion by changing terminology. It seems to me that you are trying to invalidate that term and throw out a critical part of the definition I gave so that you can object to my saying something rather different from what I actually said. I don't really appreciate that. It also seems to me that you think I am in some way condemning active bisexuals, or perhaps bisexuals in general, or some other group. If so, you are mistaken. I was describing, not endorsing, an attitude I see in our society. (It's possible I stated things badly. I don't see where I did, but people do have an unfortunate tendency when reading their own writing to see what they intended to write rather than what they actually did write.) I don't think you're condemning anything, but you are using the incorrect definition of the term "bisexual". That is all I'm trying to say. And when I say it's not a real term that is what I mean. In making up that term (which is your term, not anything that would be widely used or recognized by someone else) you are using the incorrect definition of a word. If you were to say "actively polyamorous" to describe someone who is actively engaged in multiple relationships (as opposed to someone who polyamorous but only in one relationship at the moment), that would be much closer to what you're trying to say. "Active bisexual" cannot be used to describe someone who is in more than one relationship because bisexual is an indicator of the TYPE of people you are attracted to, not the number. |
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Post by Señor Goose on Nov 27, 2013 5:15:51 GMT
Also I will never cease to chuckle mightily when people try to make the "need to keep it realistic" when it comes to gayness in a fantasy story. These are human beings though that act like real humans. The people in Harry Potter are realistic humans. The people in Lord of the Rings are realistic humans. The people in Gunnerkrigg Court are also realistic humans. As such, they should conform to realistic statistics, i.e. roughly 10% of the characters being gay. In the real world, 0% of humans practice magic. I don't see that statistic represented in this story. |
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Post by Daedalus on Nov 27, 2013 5:18:32 GMT
Ehhh, it's a small enough sample size that it's not that unlikely to have happened randomly: t-tests are fun. We could do a binomial distribution to check if you wanted. Plus, if you want to talk about other relationships that have been shown (outside of main cast), don't forget Margo/John, William/Janet, and Kat/Aly (if she is bisexual, as some people say, her relationships should fall under both categories). Plus Tony/Surma, of course. And Robot/Shadow is still open to debate. Interpreting it differently, that's 4 homosexual to 15 heterosexual. The most likely thing, as I see it, is that the story has tended to focus around a group of students that are slightly disproportionately gay in a universe that is pretty similar statistically to our own. Plus, in our universe (and presumably in the Gunnerverse), different age groups have vastly different statistics. Just saying we should not make a big deal of a small statistical anomaly. Fair, reasonable analysis. 9/10 would consider for a moment and then agree with again. Still, I think that only counting the central characters (i.e. not counting characters like Janet, Margo, and John), the gay to straight ratio is improbable. I would like to note that if we are not counting supernatural beings, both Shadow and Robot are out. That brings the count to more normal levels. Of course, the argument that the Gunnerverse's statistics could be different still stands. |
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Post by Deleted on Nov 27, 2013 5:18:58 GMT
These are human beings though that act like real humans. The people in Harry Potter are realistic humans. The people in Lord of the Rings are realistic humans. The people in Gunnerkrigg Court are also realistic humans. As such, they should conform to realistic statistics, i.e. roughly 10% of the characters being gay. In the real world, 0% of humans practice magic. I don't see that statistic represented in this story. Magic is just adding a fictional ability to the people of Gunnerkrigg Court. Making the ratio of gay to straight people unrealistically and improbably high is fundamentally altering their nature. |
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Post by Señor Goose on Nov 27, 2013 5:21:35 GMT
In the real world, 0% of humans practice magic. I don't see that statistic represented in this story. Magic is just adding a fictional ability to the people of Gunnerkrigg Court. Making the ratio of gay to straight people unrealistically and improbably high is fundamentally altering their nature. I don't see how that's different. |
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Post by Deleted on Nov 27, 2013 5:22:06 GMT
Fair, reasonable analysis. 9/10 would consider for a moment and then agree with again. Still, I think that only counting the central characters (i.e. not counting characters like Janet, Margo, and John), the gay to straight ratio is improbable. I would like to note that if we are not counting supernatural beings, both Shadow and Robot are out. That brings the count to more normal levels. Of course, the argument that the Gunnerverse's statistics could be different still stands. I counted them because even if they're not physically human, they're both humanoid and act indistinguishably from any of the human characters. As a side note, I think it'd be better if Tom portrayed them as genderless characters. In Adventure Time, the robotic character BMO is androgynous and interchangeably referred to as 'he' or 'she'. |
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