The Male Gaze and RPGs

Caution: What follows may cause reactions of “Well duh”, particularly if you are a woman.

A long time ago, I had a discussion with Nightflyer in which she mentioned that she found it easier to make male characters than female, because a female character felt like it had more assumptions built into it. I understood what she meant, but thought it a little bit ridiculous – sure, I thought, Hollywood women are always a certain way, but how does that restrict you from making any kind of female character you want?

Then, a few weeks later when I spoke to S. (whom I unfortunately don't have a secret code name for) the womanizing swordsman, he mentioned how it was more difficult to put yourself into the mindset of a female character, and I thought that this is perhaps true – as a man, I have absolutely zero knowledge of some aspects of a woman's life. I thought back to my conversation with Nightflyer, though, and wondered why the reverse wouldn't be true – after all, a woman has absolutely zero knowledge of some aspects of a man's life.

Then today, for unrelated reasons, I decided to do some deeper research of the concept of the Male Gaze. I had heard of this concept before, but I thought it boiled down basically to “women are sexualized in most works of art, because the artist expects the viewer to be male”. This is of course old hat, but the theory actually runs deeper than this. It essentially states that “most works of art are created from the point of view of a heterosexual male, even if the artist isn't a heterosexual male”. The fact that women are sexualized in art is just a symptom of this deeper undercurrent; if the artwork is made through the lens of a heterosexual male, it's natural that women would be portrayed as sexually desirable because to a heterosexual male, they are. The work of art is designed to appeal to a heterosexual male as well, of course, and for this reason women are made more beautiful – but it also serves to reinforce that “You, the viewer, are supposed to be a heterosexual man.”

That is, the Male Gaze theory doesn't just state that “Most writers are male”. It actually states – to artist and reader alike – that most movies, books, et cetera are written with an implicit message of “even if you are not a straight man, you should think like one.” I won't go into further detail explaining the theory – there's lots to be read about it all around the intarwebs – but there are numerous examples. If there's no particular reason for the main character to belong to a particular sex, you make him a straight male as a default. This helps the viewer think like a straight man, irrespective of whether they actually are one or not, which is the “goal” of a lot of fiction according to this theory.

I guess you can see where this is leading: My hypothesis is that the Male Gaze applies even in roleplaying games. What Nightflyer said basically translates into “It's difficult to make a female character, because female protagonists in fiction are not the default, so there's just so little material to take from.” Essentially, a woman has more experience being a man, even if she's never pretended to be a man, because there's just so much fiction written from that perspective. Even in roleplaying games, women are “the second sex” - the alternative rather than the default – even if your own sex happens to be female.

What do you think?