Anyone trying to kill me with a sword will have my complete attention. I wouldn't be distracted by their anatomy if they were completely nude and built like a Greek statue. Part of it might have something to do with being 48 years old and married for 18 years, but mostly, somebody is trying to kill me with a sword!

Exactly. There's this fancy biological impulse, its called flight or flight. Rumor has it, it tends to override, oh, basically everything else.

Historical armor often combined the functional and the ornamental; Roman breastplate armor is a good example.

Within a fantasy setting, social and historical context might combine to create female armor that is both practical, and flattering (e.g., plate form-fitted for females).

Without a doubt, a veteran female warrior would select substance over form....but ornamentation might also be integrated as a display of hierarchy or military rank/prowess.

Erm, the issue here isn't ornamentation, but more the lack of uniform on women. That said: I'll admit that I have a certain fondness for the bling of war, but for starters, no sane person would use parade uniforms as combat dress. Well, there were the World War 1 minor powers, but then I somewhat doubt we can call anything that happenend before, during and after WO1 "sane" with a straight face. And to give a more medieval example; anyone recall those big crests that you usually see ontop of the helmets of knights? Sure some people might have worn those things on parades or during tournaments, but there were only a handfull of people insane enough to wear those during actual combat.
Secondly: Saying that a bikini or any sort of stripperiffic outfit is somehow a dress uniform is going to take a lot of convincing - no matter how mugh gold brocade you've put on it.

As for the whole sexism issue: there's a reason why the stereotype of "women don't do geeky things" is still so prevalent, despite the rather huge percentage of women that engage in geeky activities (I don't have actual data, but in my experience it's easily a 50/50 split these days). But the shitty attitude of some men is an eniterly different topic.


Could you perhaps upload and share that collection? I know some women who might be helped with that. As you said, finding pictures of women that aren't sexualized to the point of absurdity can be somewhat of a quest of homeric proporties.

Mind that the five thousand count is the sum of all the character pics I've gathered, including men, women, androgyns, dragons, and at least one fluumph for... some reason. Female pics are... maybe half that, and a great deal of them are still quite sexualized.

That said... I'd have to do some sorting, but the total MIGHT be less than the 500 MB limit for a free photobucket account, which I might be able to put together and upload everything to.

Thank in advance. It might be easier for you to just create an archive of a folder that has the pictures you want to share and upload that archive to something like deposit files or similar filesharing services. But do whatever works for you.

Edit: Scientific fact: the ammount of typos I produce is increased by 150% when I haven't yet had my morning cup of coffee.

In that case, you might have better luck with dropbox.

What happened to pictures of cool armored women? Don't make me leave my only home on these forums, no talkie, more postie.

Fair point. but all fantasy is based in reality, that's why i go to reality as much as i do in my arguments... cause that is where it all comes from.

Really.... but one of the most basic principles of disguise is to draw attention to some major feature, and thus away from the face where most identification is made?

A man trying to make people miss his face might for instance chew on garlic and make is breath so bad it would be the major thing the target remembered about him... not his face.

Or a female who flashes her breasts to distract a target before hitting him. its done often in movies as a joke, but i've seen it done in real life.. it can work. and they guy remembers the breast, not the face of the person who hit/shot/stabbed them.

Now a light colored patch of skin might be a bad thing when trying to hide in shadows, but it might also come in handy "IF" you are seen... so it seems a personal choice to be made by the thief. Depend totally on stealth, or hedge your bets and be prepared for the "what ifs" i think both points of view here can be valid

Valid point, but the two things are not totally separate ether.... There is a LOT of overlap between the two issues.

Sorry i think you misunderstand me... i have never once said this was a good thing, or that i condoned it... im simply trying to explain the true origins of this behavior... its based in history, not in some direct, intentional malicious attack on women in general.

Also because it goes so far back in history, you are not going to change it overnight or quickly.

Dose it need to be changed... YES! absolutely! (And i say this as the father of 3 daughters who face this same issue.) but its not going to be easy or fast, and i doubt its going to happen in ether of our life times.

All very true, but where do you find the evidence of which is the chicken and which is the egg...

is the hobby "sexist" because there aren't as many women as men,

OR

are there not as many women as men because the hobby is "sexist"...

cause i can't find any evidence of the latter, and history points toward the former... at least as far as i can see.

All true, but lets be honest here... isn't that the choice of the companies involved? Right or wrong, it's their choice of who to market to. And if you are right, and it costs them tones of money (which it probably will, i agree) then they will fail and a business that dose not make that mistake will rise up to take there place. that's the beauty of the free market. vote with your dollars, and you will eventually win.

I cant speak to this as i have not attended a Con in a few years, but i dont remember it being a huge issue when GenCon was in Milwaukee and i was a regular attendee along with my wife and Daughters.

How is this sexism. to my understanding sexism implies assumptions and forcing roles on others they do not want. now i know this did happen, but in this case, im just trying to explain where it came from, not justify it. knowing where something comes from is the first step in understanding it, and eventually fixing it... i mean isn't that what we are suppose to do today? understand the other sides position and then show them the error of there ways through reason and logic?

that's all i'm going to say on the forums about this, but if you like id love to continue this discussion in private messages if you like... bring on the photos...

PS, your right, Good pictures of "practical" female armor are hard to find, but have you considered that there are very few historical references for female armor, but HUGE amounts of references for male armor.. that might be a contributing factor.

Larian: Once again, you miss the point of most disguise tactics. It's not just to keep people from looking at your face, it's to get them to remember some false detail. A fake scar, a gold tooth-cap or faked bad breath are all things that will go away once the job is done.

FAKE breasts (say, from a heavily padded bra) might qualify, as they distract the guy from studying the woman's face, and once removed, she looks completely different.

Flaunting real breasts (and the way the armor and clothing we're talking about here is cut, it's pretty obvious the cleavage is genuine), OTOH, means you're highlighting an easily identifiable trait for later recognition by the target.

*******

Furthermore, what, precisely, is the point of saying, "It's going to take time to fix this?" Feminists and feminist allies know all that. The response, though, is, "So let's get started." Making big changes incrementally is a matter of applying constant, steady pressure. And one aspect of that is highlighting sexist portrayals of women, and calling them out. Every. Last. Time.