I read "titanium tacos" and lost it completely. I'm so glad people are still awake or I'd have awoken the entire house.

 

Happy to help, MC. I enjoy making people smile.

 

I said once, "There's nothing further opposite of Bayformers than Beast Wars."

I was wrong, MLP FiM is further opposite than BW.

ANYWAY, there would be no titanium  . That's my point, they wouldn't actually be female, they would just use those pronouns. It's like if people wanted male boats, or Jaegers. They're not actually girls. Hell, I'd have trouble coming up with a more traditionally masculine image than Gypsy Danger.

And of course MLP has gender. They're ponies, they don't bud for Primus' sake. Also Discord is a badass, I've seen that episode. Do I get points for that?

And I don't appreciate being played as the straight man. We're both funny guys, but you're humor is like water and mine is like coffee. Mine is a bit more dry and a lot more flavorful  

 

I may buy the comic or trade for just to add it to my collection. I have no interest i either the writer or character.

 

Yes, you do. (Gives Galvy a gold star sticker)

That's a good way of describing our personalities. Water and coffee. (Hugs)

But to cut out the analogy, I would like 'male' bots, even if those 'male' bots were about as 'female' as the other 'female' bots.

 

DID SOMEONE SAY COFFEE?!

Oh... nevermind... (leaves.)

 

I still like you, Coffee!

 

I know very well how important is. I believe that in fiction involving humans, there should be more prominent, realistically portrayed women (see the Bechdel test). In fiction involving humans, I think there should also be better representation of blacks, latinos, gays, Asians, etc.

We aren't talking about fiction involving humans. We are talking about extraterrestrial robots. Talking about representation for blacks, Latinos, or any other race would be absurd, because Cybertronians don't have race in the same sense humanity does. Roberts was able to create metaphors, as good sci-fi does, through which he could address prejudice, in the form of the functionalist a and monoformers. But they aren't blacks, Asians, etc.

Just as it would be silly to talk about Tongan representation in transformers, since they don't have race in the way humanity does, it is silly to talk about women representation in a species that does not have any purpose for sexes. Could Scott create a substitute for sex by which Scott could address sexual identity issues? Perhaps. But that isn't the route she has chosen to take: by all accounts, she is shoehorning the concept of sex on a species for which sex has no purpose.

It is very comprehensible that a race which does not reproduce sexually would not gave any kind of sexual identity.

 

Yes. I find it strange that the crowd critiquing is being depicted as a bunch of drunken Hell's Angels wreaking bedlam. There are a few being jerks, sure. There's also a lot of fembots advocates treating anyone who is critical of fembots like complete assholes. That's how Internet discussions usually work: there are. Loud, obnoxious voices on both sides, but you can still have a reasonable conversation if you put in some effort.

BTW, Galv, I understand you weren't criticizing feminism. I apologize if I appeared to be criticizing you. I think there were a few other, more obnoxious fembots naysayers who made some disparaging remarks about feminism.

Likewise. And I'll agree with those who feel Margaret made a rational criticism of Furman's origin for Arcee. I don't agree with it, buy I think it was valid, and expressed in a professional and civil manner. For Furman's to take it so personally is pretty asinine.

 

Professional and civil, but her opinion still reads as: "He had an idea, and sucked at it. So we're going to do it instead, only better!" I mean, she gives his original intent barely half a paragraph of acknowledgment, and then states his original intent "only works in a vacuum", as if this was a statement of fact.

So this guy, who gets crapped on my the fans constantly, then has a slightly more polite crap taken on him by a fellow writer now too. I won't disagree that he's taking it a little personally, but I can't necessarily fault him for it either.

 

You need to re-read Spotlight: Arcee. Her origin as written specifically excludes other female bots.

And yes, there are other female bots. Elita-One, Firestar, Chromia, Moonracer, and others. They had yet to be introduced into the IDW continuity, but Furman's origin of Arcee specifically excluded them being introduced as female without modification similar to what Jihaxus did, and that's problematic regarding the introduction of the characters mentioned above.

 

you know both sides of this argument seems to have fallen into the trap, the trap that both Furman and Scott have fallen into themselves.

Transformers were not about gender or sex until people like furman and Scott decided to look at transformers through that angle. Transformers were simply robots in disguise it didn't matter if they looked Male or Female, as long as the robot in disguise aspect was represented all was good.

it's sad that as it evolved as a concept this became a factor in how things were perceived

 

Everyone keeps saying this, and I keep not understanding it. What keeps any other fembot from choosing a gender identity as female, even if they aren't biologically a female? What's to keep them from saying "This pronoun is what I choose to be."? It's like everyone thinks they have to be inherently female for it to count.

Yes, Arcee precluded inherent biological sex. Which makes sense. Because they're robots. You're not going to have a robot with a biological sex unless you tamper with it. Which was the point of the experimentation. But that doesn't mean a robot can't say "I identity as a gender." I mean real people do that ALL the time.

So how does Arcee exclude that possibility?

 

I am a female…

I've read Spotlight Arcee… didn't hate it, didn't LOVE it… I respected the story, felt sad that what was done to Arcee made her character the way she became. It was dark, it was different. I don't want it reconned out of existence because I like where they have taken it since. The character has grown, dealt with the conflict, and I think she's in a better place. It would be disrespectful to take that away from the character at this point.

I voted for the fan character and voted for a female because I thought it would be interesting to have more ladies in the fiction. Arcee is the only lady bot with any consistency of being there in different iterations of storylines. I sort of want to see more than just her and no other lady bots. I'm a girl who'd like to see a little bit more representation of other characters I can relate to. (I've ALWAYS felt this since I was an 8 year old girl watching G1, I've been consistent in that. I don't really care if OTHER girls found other characters to relate to, you did, FANTASTIC. I found it hard to relate to, but obviously I still loved it despite that.)

Prime Arcee is awesome. Probably one of the first I have seen of the female main characters that was incredibly strong, I could get behind her. She's flawed, opinionated, cares about her friends… she's someone I can relate to.

Did I know they were going to throw the fan made/voted character at IDW and say "put this in there, k? Thanks." No. If I had I wouldn't have voted the way I did. But it is the way it is.

So, to be honest, we get what we ask for, just not in the way we would have predicted. We only have ourselves to blame. So BEST BE CAREFUL what you ask for, or you just MIGHT get it. (Just in ways you can't predict and in situations you didn't think it was going to effect.)

This doesn't mean that we deserve what we get. I think IDW have handled story in the past well, I think they will continue to do so now. I have never seen them handle past work in a disrespectful manner. I'm interested to see how they take the female challenge. I will give any writer the same respect I gave Furman when I first read Spotlight Arcee. I'll give Mairghread the same.

Maighread Scott has not said she's gonna recon the Arcee story. I don't know why those who are raging are assuming that is the case. So far IDW have not been recon happy, they don't just recon because they have a new writer and something needs to be changed. (And I don't SEE IDW reconning the Arcee situation.) But yes, after the fan vote its clear that females are liked and they've been asked for.

No one says the 4 issues are going to focus on Windblade specifically. Have you read the solicits yet? Only the preview for 2014 right? Sure she's on the cover of issue #1 but she can't be the ONLY character in that 4 issues? There are bound to be "other" characters in the issues. Who knows maybe issue #1 is her, issue #2 is someone else, issue #3 another, etc. And the series has scrolled across it "The Dawn of the Autobots?" hmmmm… I think I'm not going to assume anything about this series. As far as we know this could be 2014's version of the Spotlights. (What's this??? Shane may be writing something too? Why does this smell more and more like Spotlights… )

I'M GIVING IDW A CHANCE to publish something before I go rage against it.

While I've enjoyed what IDW continuity has done, I think that the gender issue is one that has become an issue in the last few years specifically because Hasbro never set their position on it from the very beginning. And to make matters worse they've ignored the issue far too long. However I want this new focus to make sense for the continuity too. If IDW can give it a reason other than addressing it just because they can, (or because they were asked to) I will respectfully read it and give it a chance.

If it's not… I'll frown at it… and I'll be honest in my disappointment as a reviewer of the comics. But chances are that IDW is bound to win me over in some way. And I'll give them the chance to try.


Also… have to say that I've identified all TFs as MALE because they've been calling them "HE" since I was 8 years old. (And only occasionally she.) Genderless… maybe… but the signals are a little mixed up to be honest. Partly because the audience is all human reading their Cybertronian adventures. It's a LITTLE hard to have consistency on a brand that has pretty much flaunted their inconsistency as a strength. While IDW has only been running their continuity for a shorter amount of time, again, they've been calling them by "HE" since the beginning and now we are gonna debate that they SHOULD have been calling them "they?" Talk about keeping the potential new readers at arms length. That would take some getting used to to be honest, jumping into a comic that looks and feels like "hard scifi." Just my opinion of course, but that would definitely make the readership of TFs even more smaller if they did that. I think it wise to keep their demographics as broad as possible. I mean haven't comic popularity been diminishing for years… ?

You know the human race just needs to adopt a genderless pronoun and then this argument would be moot. You never know what alien race will someday visit the earth and then the rage will destroy us all!

And yes, next the laws of physics need to change over night as well… space travel and transporters… nuff said.

 

Agreed. Why would a comic book need to explain why a race of aliens have gender or women and why would we constantly care how fictional properties portray men or women. It matters not slightly on our real lives whatsoever.

 

I still don't understand how people are saying TFs are "non-gendered". Those are some pretty masculine voices, and physiques and pronouns for a gender-free society. To say nothing of "female Transformers have existed since the second year of the franchise, and have been conspicuously present and even fan favorites ever since".

Even in IDW, by virtue of SL Arcee, Transformers have gender now, if they didn't before. So it kind of doesn't matter that Transformers don't "need" gender - they have it already. The robo-horse is out of the mecha-barn. In that case, can we do something a little less grotesque with the concept of "robot gender" than "This one agender robot was basically made into a lady robot, which forced all the other agender robots to realize that they were dudes and she was Different and now she's a CRAY CRAY MURDER MACHINE????"

 

ENGLISH needs to other languages have been fine doing it for years. The Finish language for example doesn't even have gendered pronouns.

 

I will add one last thing to this, as I've basically got to take all this and put it into a bullet point format for the next Moonbase 2, and I can use this post as a capper.

Science fiction, or fiction in general, rarely succeeds when it dehumanises its protagonists. Whether you view it as hard science fiction or not, your protagonists are more frequently humans or humans in all but appearance. This is because we need to relate to these characters. The personalities established in this universe are relatable because they are humans in all but body, and no one can really argue otherwise. And with that comes conscious or subconscious gender identity, whether you will it or no.

Yes, if we wanted to be realistic, transformers would not have gender. Or fingers. Or mouths. But transformers are not, and have never been, realistic. They have been treated as every other popular science fiction franchise has been treated, whether they are aimed at children or adults. Simon had his reasons for doing what he did, and Mairghread has her reasons for doing what she will. Both have valid points. But they are writing very different types of fiction.

I won't say more because i'm still summarising my thoughts but I will say, if you can enjoy Firefly, Farscape or Star Trek despite the ass kicking they give biology, physics and chemistry...robots with gender are a minor hurdle in my opinion. Yes, it'd be a fascinating concept to examine without gender...but this universe has not developed in a fashion where it can properly explore this.

For more, listen to next moonbase 2! I'm thinking about having dramatic music infront of this section  

 

.

Yet we still have Chromedome. And did you seriously just say that?

 

I'm not reading 65 pages of this thread. I just dropped in to say:

1) We've always had male and female gendered TFs everywhere. Gender is not the same as sex nor necessarily related to it. Optimus Prime as he is presented is just as male as Elita One is female in every way that it matters to Transformers (body form, personality/mentality, socially, grammarily, and vocally) and that goes line wide. Female TFs are no odder and require no more explanation than the regular male type bots and neither are any more ridiculous than a billion other ridiculous and inextricable parts of the TF franchise.

2) Looking forward to Scott's comic a lot. Her original comments were dead on true about the issues with Arcee's origin and she seems to honestly want to approach this right. And she's done some really good character work in what I've read of her work. She's a wonderful choice for this.  

3) I'm dissappointed in Simon for his response in a number of ways, as Scott was very cordial and very polite and respectful of his work in her comments, making the why of it not working very clear as a matter of outside context and not any inherent flaw or negative intention on his part, and his antagonistic response to that is really sad to see for someone who loved his stuff growing up.


-ZacWilliam, there, said it, done.