Quote Originally Posted by HakuroDK View Post
[Very civil post.]
First of all, bravo on having a coherent and civilized response to something on the internet, especially in regards to hot-button topic such as this. As you've been one of the more rational posters to appear in this thread, I'd like to pose some questions to you in regards to some of the statements you made.

The reason representation of the LGBT community is important in any game where themes related to romance or sexuality is addressed would be exclusively for equality's sake. If a man can have relations with a woman, then a man should be able to have relations with a man and a woman should be able to have relations with a woman. Doesn't matter if the relations are sexual in nature, if they're innocently romantic in nature, etc.
This is a stance I do not honestly understand. Why are there "should"'s in these statements? Given the fictional nature of this game, why "should" there be representations like this in the game? I've seen many people argue that because a game developer can do it, they should, but that's not really addressing the question of why they should. Square-Enix has certainly taken the effort to include some references to SGR, but why should the lore have be fully representative of its real-life counterparts?

One of the draws of an MMORPG is that one gets to feel like they themselves are the hero of this epic tale, and that our characters have some sort of ephemeral tie to our real-life selves. As such, I understand the desire to have options to maximizing that potential; however, as you've noted yourself, there are limits to these options. I think the options should only be limited based on creative vision. I think if SE wants to include options for SGR because it makes sense to them from a creative standpoint, then they should do that, and make it clear in the game's lore why this is an acceptable part of the game world's environment. SE should also be able to do the opposite: have a game world where that just isn't part of the lore, or if it is, to what extent it's a factor. Customers can then make their choice to play the game based in part on their interest in that particular aspect of the game. What I don't like is SE trying to cater to the whims of a global audience with wildly varying opinions on the subject.

Would you agree that SE's attempts to "sit on the fence" are probably the most hurtful because it inflames their audience into arguments over SE's ambiguity?

I just think you need to find and talk to some folks in the LGBT community who aren't virulently extremist, because it sounds to me like those are the ONLY LGBT individuals you have ever met, and I apologize for that, because I believe that's the culture rearing its ugly head and it should not be representative of everyone in the LGBT community.
I'd like to just repost this for the sake of more people seeing it. This is so true, and I do think it's sad that a lot of people's contact with the LGBT community seems to be based solely on what they encounter on the internet. Every group, not just LGBT, has its zealots. In the real-life physical world, people tend to be much more sensible about discussing topics such as these. It's a pity it happens so rarely because I think we'd progress a lot further a lot faster if our discussions on topics like this happened off the internet where we had to face the people we disagreed with.