Jimquisition: Mass Effect 3 And The Case For A Gay Shepard

[stonemaskstoryteller]

There have been FAR worse things in video games than two men climbing into bed with each other and for ignorant individuals in the gaming community to whine and cry about optional gay relationships is, frankly, pathetic.

Unless you are somehow prone to phycological turmoil (In which case, seek help) otherwise just ignore the chatup lines.

at the end of the day, Noone is trying to change what you believe so don't be arrogant and expect anyone else to change for you.

 

[stonemaskstoryteller]

yeah, It's just depressing.

 

[jovack22]

I used to dislike the inquisition when it first came out, but now this is one of the best things on this website.

 

[theheroofaction]

Firs off, let me tell you my stance. I ( who for reference, am a dude) prefer women. I find dick to be gross, this means I would be thoroughly against entering in homosexual relations. But I'm not going to belittle someone for liking something I don't, and except under certain circumstances, I think it is a good thing when people engage in sexual relations, whether of the same or different sex.


On to the point. First, and most importantly, I want to say that the option of homosexuality was supposed to exist since the beginning of the series, but got cut due ti the bioware execs wanting to avoid catching flak. Now, however, they appear to have metaphorically grown a pair, and want people to be able to experience everything they make. If, however, they manage this the same way they manage DA2, it will be a tiny bit odd that every crew member would be bi, but then, considering the biological diversity of the ME universe, it would be extremely common to just take what you can get.


And one more thing.

snip

Jim was referring to physical attraction to phallic objects, as opposed to just liking them. male Homosexuality is defined as physical attraction to a phallus and similar objects.
While the words are interchanged a lot, lust and like have much different meanings.
For example:
I will admit to liking guns. I don't however find attraction in them, nothing about them "turns me on".

Related to that, one wouldn't believe how often I have to inform people that there is no disagreement.

 

[Daystar Clarion]

so ignoring Jim's sad use of ad hominems, does he realize that Liara isn't a female?

If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck...

If your attracted to something that, for all intents and purposes, looks just like a woman, then chances are, you're into women.

Not that simple since everyone is attracted to them in some way regardless of both gender and species. There's just something about them. Unless you want to argue every species in the universe has the hots for human women.

Well, from what I gathered in game (the bachelor party on Illium), all the races think the Asari look like their own.

Now, I haven't read anything to suggest that the Asari use some sort of brain control or pheromone to attract a mate, but hey, it's sci-fi.

 

[jovack22]

Good job pointing out F'ing morons like Xanthious.... i hate kids that feel they need to play devil's advocate to appear intelligent... or worse yet, he's just a bigot fool

 

[Airsoftslayer93]

Fun vid, thanks Jim. Still think a gay shepard is (for the most part) retconning, and still think retconning should be avoided as much as possible; but yeah, after last week's thread i say let Shepard be queer and proud of it, that pedophile = gay stuff conviced me that it was actually a neccesary option in ME 3.

Well hypothetically i could have played both of the previous 2 games without any relationship because my shepard was gay, that wouldn't make this a retcon, just his first opportunity

 

[stonemaskstoryteller]

I just can't understand how some people can be so full of hate or disgust towards people hey don't even know? what's teh point in wasting your life hating just to growup and be a bitter old bastard?

also What a lot of people forget is that Homosexuality, like Heterosexuality, is not just a form of sex but also a form of love. and it deserves our respect because of it.

 

[synobal]

Jim I want to ask why you have a big dong on a stick but I'm afraid of the answer.... so so afraid.

 

[RedEyesBlackGamer]

Considering the ending of this Jimquisition i think I will share my personal opinion.

Well now, I do have a problem with gay people. Aka they are sick in the head and whatever excuse medics came up in USA when they realized they can't cure them did not just made them normal... Look, curing schizophrenia is not easy either. If possible at all.

Define what it is that makes homosexuality a mental illness. Define why, if homosexuality is a mental illness, heterosexuality can't be seen as a mental illness as well.

Heterosexuality makes babies. Homosexuality doesn't.

Frankly it IS, from an evolutionary point of view, wrong. Thats not wrong in a moral sense, but wrong in a continuation of the species sense.

I can fully understand why some consider it a mental illness, arguably an inherited or developed one.

My argument would be, so what? If it makes someone happy and does not inflict harm on them or others then whats the problem?

Something can't be "wrong" from an evolutionary standpoint. Instead of saying that it has no reason to exist, you should be exploring why it has persisted if the answer isn't immediately obvious.

 

[MatParker116]

It was in Mass Effect 1 & 2 at one point:




Really have no idea why it was cut.

Your guess is as good as mine, I mean its clearly there in the dragon age games if you go looking for it just as those vids show would have been in both Mass Effects if they had left it in. Personally though I wish that they would have at least left Ashley[footnote]even with my femshep characters I chose her over Kaiden[/footnote] open to being bi so I that I could have romanced her with my femshep.

I also would of gone for Ashley had I had the choice.

 

[Stilkon]

Jim, I don't think that last argument was actually equating gay people to pedophiles. I think what people were saying was "If we make amenities for gays, then we'll have to make amenities for everyone else, up to and including pedophiles".

Not that I'm saying it's a valid point; it's still batshit insane. It's like that unofficial law of the internet (the name of which is eluding me) where everything gets compared to Hitler. I imagine a similar one exists for pedophiles.

 

[ZexionSephiroth]

Okay... So there's gay options in mass effect; Okay, that's fine... One question though... Why is it that there's only one Female with (kinda) Female option that I'm aware of? I mean, serriously? Where are your priorities people?

One thing to bring to arguments like this is perspective. And While a few people can view the topic with some perspective on the m/m side of things and thus come up with an elegant defence, how can it be that they forget the f/f side of things that is so clearly neglected by both developer and fans; with the simple fact that there are, what, half a dozen m/m options but ONLY ONE F/F OPTION? *deep breaths* *Deep Breaths*

I wouldn't mind so much if adding more f/f didn't make sense, but the pure fact is that considering gamers as a whole; Wether guy or girl; Straight, Gay or Lesbian: The community should more or less be split right down the middle in terms of which gender of partner they prefer (assumably, considering Female and male gamers are about equal in number at last count).

And thus it would make perfect sense, marketing wise, for there to be just as many F/F options as M/M options. Because Straight Guys combined with Lesbian girls should be about equal in number to Straight Girls combined with Gay Guys. And I don't see any reason why a game like one in the mass effect series would have a higher rate of one side of the equation than the other.

And... I'm ranted out. So in conclusion. Don't take out the Male on Male, just put in more Female on Female... also excuse me while I catch my breath.

 

[Otaku World Order]

Heh it wasnt cut out of 2...

If you were a female Shepherd you could get it on with Kelly, the female Yoeman...<.<

FemShep could flirt with Kelly and invite her to dinner, but that was it. At least as far as I could tell.

Although, FemShep still seems veeery interested in Asari table dancers.

I've got one problem with Bioware including gay romance options in ME3 that DOESN'T stem from homophobia: It's that they waited until ME3 to include them.

Very true, especially considering how the first game got a lot of mileage out of the lesbian sex with aliens thing.

Of course, if it was just FemShep, this probably wouldn't be such a big deal. After all, the idea of FemShep trying to get in Miranda's or Ashley's pants is fine, but once you have two guys going at it it's HORRIBLE and WRONG! Honestly, I thought we were all past this issue back in the 90's.

As for the people who think homosexuality and paedophilia are the same thing... Stop. Just stop. I don't want to have to break out my Shizune picture [http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v438/CCSchlueter/Shizune%20Memes/ShizuneMeme1.png] again.

 

[Minjen]

Well done sir. The only ones to fear this trend are 100% homophobic completionists.
I guess some people cant live with options they are free not to choose, like go outside in -40C winter cold butt naked.

 

[I Max95]

-snip-

firstly, there is NO CANON SHEPARD your Shepard is only canon in YOUR game, it doesnt matter what other Shepards do your shepard does whatever you want him to do. it isnt a retcon if the character's entire existance and choices depend on player choice. if the player chooses for Shepard to be gay, then Shepard IS gay, it isnt a retcon, if you say that he/she isnt, then you know what, you are also correct, with YOUR Shepard

secondly, refering to the bold, you are implying that a gay person always appears to be gay, like he/she can't help but show it, that isn't true, i've met plenty of straight people whom i thought were gay, and gay people whom i thought were straight, all through school people made fun of me for being gay, problem is, i'm perfecly straight, you can't guess anything about sexuality by "hints" or any kind of tendecies they previously exhibited

good god! did you even watch the video this thread is about?!
i'm basically repeating what Jim already said
watch it again, see if you understand then

BS, there is a cannon shepard, ME is an ongoing franchise with multiple tie ins and of course there's a cannon shepard, just as there is a cannon Master Chief in Halo or a cannon prisioner escapee for Elder Scrolls.

For your second point, what i am saying is that, given the circumstances shown in the first 2 games, it is indeed very higly unlikely at the very least for shepard to be gay, so, him being gay on the third game is a retcon. I don't know what you understand by that, but according to wikipedia retcons can be non disruptive as in: "Some retcons do not directly contradict previously established facts, but "fill in" missing background details, usually to support current plot points.", and this is clearly that, an addition retcon, i can't even see what you are arguing about.

Thirdly, i am just answering to quotes,my first post here and on the other thread didn't focused on retcon issues, people quoted that part, so i assumed they want to talk about them.

uh, no, there is NOT a canon Elder Scrolls Prisoner escapee, they could be any race, and make any number of decisions throughout those games, there is not a single elder scrolls proagonist that could be considered "canon" same for Shepard. and then you mention Master Cheif from Halo, of course there is a canon Master Cheif, he's a defined character, the player makes no decisions when playign as him, the story only goes ONE way. basically you just reitorated your original statement that there "was a canon shepard" it's just as false now as it was then

and how could you possibly tell how likely it is for Shepard to have been gay in the first two games, there were no gay characters for him to talk to, no comfirmation of Shepard's sexuality that wasn't chosen by the player

i like debating unimportant things,it's fun to debate, but just so you know, this argument is entirely pointless, Shepard can be gay now if the player chooses, that's the long and short of it, don't like it, don't have your Shepard be gay

 

[Magnalian]

I find it a little bit difficult to take Jim seriously when he's telling people to grow up while holding a giant dildo..

 

[everfreeDragon]

I care about the sudden ability to be gay in ME3 less and less every time I see news of it.. I didn't watch last week due to avoiding ME3 info in hopes of going in pretty much blind, mixed with the general reactions it got. This week my first thought was, "really Jim, same subject two weeks in a row?" I'm probably not even gonna go back and watch these later. I really have no damns to give about Shepard being able to be gay.