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What is your opinion about Jormag's gender?


Terter.4125

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@Tommo Chocolate.5870 said:I try not to think too much about the Hobbit movies though...

They have become my favorite movies, to be honest. Then again, I've never read the novel, so I can't compare, because TLotR already bored me to death (I never got past the first dozen pages with the endless description of the Shire and Hobbits). I find them (the Hobbit movies) much better than the LotR movies because of the freedom Peter Jackson took to breathe some fresh air into it and expand on the story (with new characters, story tweaks etc). It's an epic tale and it felt a lot more dynamic than the LotR adaptation. Besides the tense atmosphere, I also liked the acting and the special effects make-up a lot better than in TLotR. Anyway...

Otherwise I completely agree with everything you wrote. :)

On the other hand, Jormag's followers care deeply about gender politics and have very strong views on the matter - so Jormag's gender (if the idea of it having one even makes sense, which I'm not convinced that it does) could well be relevant to the story.

That's exactly the point, isn't it? It could make for an interesting story twist from their perspective. I hope the writing will meet my expectations. ;)

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Possible Spoilers....What we know about the SoS has little bearing one who or what jormag is or identifies as.

In the Bitterfrost Frontier we get a really good look at fully indoctrinated Sons of Svanir. I got the impression that the process leaves many pretty much mindless drones. The one SoS leader we talk to expresses surprise our disguised character can even talk or think, and we are made to speak as if we are impaired in our ability to discourse. The leader seemed to have his station because he got through the process more intellectually I tact. I also remember someone telling me SoS can't reproduce, but I don't know if that is canonical. But if so, it wouldn't be a stretch to think the dragon leaves females alone so it would always have a self-generating supply of recruits.

As for the cult, it is based on Svanir and his sister's meeting with a jormag minion, not jormag itself. It makes sense the rules of the cult draw its tenets from that story. Making women and what they represent to some member the "evil" force in the story. It also makes those SoS group members' sacrifice seem all the more complete -- giving up all the comforts of home and hearth for ultimate power - rejecting mothers, sister, lovers, friends, companions -- half of the norn race, as well as the other Male norns who forego the gift, further isolating then and making them even more willing servants of jormag.

At this point who knows if norn women are truly resistant or it is a matter of convenience. If jormag feels truly threatened it could change the status quo.

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@BrokenGlass.9356 said:

@BrokenGlass.9356 said:Anyone every wonder what gender Smoug was? I didn't. If I remember correctly, Tolkien never got into dragon breeding at all. I think that was wise.

No one had a chance to wonder - Smaug is consistently referred to using male pronouns, not just in the dialogue, but in the rest of the text as well.

True that. And the story reads the same if you swap em. No Smaug love life. No Smaug eggs. No Smaug opinions on gender politics. Smaug is just a horrible force to be overcome. Like, don't personify the villain... We, the audience don't like it much. If you make me sympathize with the monster before you kill it at the end, it ends up a very different movie.

Interesting, I think Smaug has more personality than any of the dwarves, elves or humans in The Hobbit, and I sympathise with him more than I do with any of them! And I think personifying villains - and especially making sure they have coherent motives rather than that they're just evil for plot reasons - is a good thing when it's done well. I try not to think too much about the Hobbit movies though...

I agree that you could change Smaug's gender without changing the story. In fact, the same is true of any character in The Hobbit. On the other hand, Jormag's followers care deeply about gender politics and have very strong views on the matter - so Jormag's gender (if the idea of it having one even makes sense, which I'm not convinced that it does) could well be relevant to the story.

I can dig all that.

But, doesn't it seem amazingly politically correctly convenient that the villains who literally embody the patriarchy, are worshipping a trans dragon? (I'm well aware non-binary in this case isn't trans. The language is intentional so it's easy to see how both sides see it from afar.)

It just has a feel that says. "if you have the same political bent as us, then you too can laugh as the oppressive patriarchy too!"

To be honest, I find the whole situation with the Sons' of Svanir sexism to be pretty crass. It doesn't really make sense in the context of the game world. Instead, it feels like it's there as a power fantasy, and an excuse for the fact that we go around killing them. And I say this as someone with the exact views that they're trying to pander to. So yes, there's a real danger that if Jormag's gender is relevant to the plot, it will be handled in a heavy-handed way that just feels like another invitation to laugh at some sexist idiots. But the writers must be aware of that - so hopefully they won't fall into that trap.

Like... If this was flipped, and the Daughters of Svanir hate all male characters and belittle them. Treat them like red-headed-step-children. Then it comes out the giant Dragon they worship isn't female at all.

Just saying, nobody is going to tell that second story. And it's because of the political climate.

Sure, but cultural context is relevant to art and media of all kinds - that's unavoidable.

Playing a story to the political in-crowd is cheap low hanging fruit. You know what it feels like to leave a movie and feel like.... "did the giant decepticon's balls have to clang together? This movie would have been better without that." and it's not because there were giant balls. It's because you knew they were pandering to who they think you are.

Please tell me that's a genuine example!

@Ashantara.8731 said:

@Tommo Chocolate.5870 said:I try not to think too much about the Hobbit movies though...

They have become my favorite movies, to be honest. Then again, I've never read the novel, so I can't compare, because TLotR already bored me to death (I never got past the first dozen pages with the endless description of the Shire and Hobbits). I find them (the Hobbit movies) much better than the LotR movies because of the freedom Peter Jackson took to breathe some fresh air into it and expand on the story (with new characters, story tweaks etc). It's an epic tale and it felt a lot more dynamic than the LotR adaptation. Besides the tense atmosphere, I also liked the acting and the special effects make-up
a lot
better than in TLotR. Anyway...

Otherwise I completely agree with everything you wrote. :)

The reasons I don't like The Hobbit movies are quite complicated, so I won't go into detail here - but the short version is I think Peter Jackson completely missed the entire point of the story with his adaptation. As for LotR, I used to feel the same way. I didn't get into it until I realised that it's not really about the story - it's primarily about worldbuilding. The story is mostly there as an excuse to get some characters to travel through the world of Middle Earth, and Tolkien primarily uses hobbits for that because they know almost as little about it as the reader does. Once I appreciated that I really got a lot out of it.

On the other hand, Jormag's followers care deeply about gender politics and have very strong views on the matter - so Jormag's gender (if the idea of it having one even makes sense, which I'm not convinced that it does) could well be relevant to the story.

That's exactly the point, isn't it? It could make for an interesting story twist from their perspective. I hope the writing will meet my expectations. ;)

Absolutely - or it could make for a really crass one! I really hope they handle it well.

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Yep it's a real example. Pretty sure it was transformers 2? Maybe 3. When all the big construction machine deception robots come together into the giant super bot. The characters are communicating across raido beneath its giant swinging wrecking ball nuts.

Unfortunately, they thought that joke could carry the biggest action scene in the film... And it leaves you thinking... Which writer listened to thier seven year old, and why in the world did they think that wouldn't shatter my immersion? I bet you there's fourms discussing what equipment Megatron keep under the trunk, all because they confirmed the existence of transformer testicles.

It was low hanging fruit. Pun unintended (wince)

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@"Gopaka.7839" said:Many players, including Wooden Potatoes, have this theory of Jormag being female because of the voice that was having in the new saga cinematic. What do you think... do you agree or disagree with this theory ? I would like to hear the Arena Net devs confirming on this one so we can stop analyzing every bit of a detail.Edit: Because of the many given opinions so far I would like to add. I'm not asking about what sex organs Jormag is having, because a lot of players are having mixed opinion on this subject and escalate and give quite the abstract thinking. I'm asking about what gender does Jormag represent in your opinion given the new saga cinematic? Is it giving you a male or a female characteristics.

Officially, it has been stated that Jormag is non-binary. So, not male, not female, and we aren't wondering.

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@"Warkind.6745" said:Humanizing the elder dragons was a bad idea overall. First having them talk, and now assigning them genders has just removed any intrigue or fear of the unknown they could have inspired.

Technically, Elder Dragons were officially neither male nor female back in 2010. Before people cared about all this political view bullshit.

Elder Dragons had concept of strategy and mental process since 2010. And Elder Dragons were communicating with Tyrians since 2007 (Svanir says "Hello").

BTW, making something interactive on a sapient level and having emotions is not really humanizing. There's a lot of room between "human" (both intelligent and emotional), "robot" (intelligent but emotionless), "animalistic" (emotional but non-intelligent), and "mindlessness" (neither emotional nor intelligent).

@Dashingsteel.3410 said:Can't let the story get in the way of the woke agenda....

The only reason why the Elder Dragons' gender is being brought up, is because the playerbase asked devs about it. Nothing political behind it all. But I guess that won't stop people from bitching about a non-issue.

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I'd venture that folks are mostly upset because the two sided nature of the argument's most extreme arms.

By acknowledging non-binary, in that language, gave the appearance of a political bias. And so, because most of the folks who hold that view, run media and Hollywood (with notable exceptions)... The perceived continuation of the narrative is what's upsetting people.

It's why I said that it's low hanging fruit. The people ask you a politically loaded question. Why? Because the lower age, and thus 'increased wokeness' AND 'increased conservatism' of the player base ment that the question got asked a lot. Blue team asked about Jormag's gender cause "I want the game developers to carve out a safe space for people like me" let's see if they did. Red team asked about Jormag's gender cause "did that bigass dragon have a chick voice?! They're dragons!" they wanted to see if the narrative they perceived was in play.

So what should Anet have done when continuously being asked about a political hot spot issue? Recognize what we learned from the g@merg@te controversy. The player base of any game is amazingly diverse, across all metrics by which diversity can be measured. So, do not pander to one side simply sidestep the question by acknowledgeing its too political to answer.

Anet-'The question of Jormag's gender has been raised by many of our fans. We'd simply like to point out that thunderstorms, and mountains don't have genders, and dragons have more in common with them than they do with us.'

Why is this different from what they did?

And look, the infraction is amazingly small. Like I'm not even mad. (I just like doing analysis) they used the term non-binary. (which would be OK, but uncomfortable as this fact is, the two sides do not agree on the existence of this term.)

If you answer down the middle, and play to' fans of fantasy writing' you get your whole audience. With out reminding half of them that there is a war of ideas to fight.

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I'm calling it now: Jormag's probably going to play out similar to Lust from Darksiders 3. Both have a fairly adrogynous voice (appearance probably not so much what with Jormag being a dragon and all that, but Anet could still surprise usbwith a humanoid form somewhere down the line), both make promises of things trying to appeal to one's desires, and it would not surprise me if Jormag ends up beinf referred to as 'they' in the story once things get going here.

I'm definitrly getting DS3 Lust vibes from our latest spotlight dragon.

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@Dashingsteel.3410 said:

@"Warkind.6745" said:Humanizing the elder dragons was a bad idea overall. First having them talk, and now assigning them genders has just removed any intrigue or fear of the unknown they could have inspired.

Technically, Elder Dragons were officially neither male nor female back in 2010. Before people cared about all this political view kitten.

Elder Dragons had concept of strategy and mental process since 2010. And Elder Dragons were communicating with Tyrians since 2007 (Svanir says "Hello").

BTW, making something interactive on a sapient level and having emotions is not really humanizing. There's a lot of room between "human" (both intelligent and emotional), "robot" (intelligent but emotionless), "animalistic" (emotional but non-intelligent), and "mindlessness" (neither emotional nor intelligent).

@Dashingsteel.3410 said:Can't let the story get in the way of the woke agenda....

The only reason why the Elder Dragons' gender is being brought up, is because the playerbase asked devs about it. Nothing political behind it all. But I guess that won't stop people from kitten about a non-issue.

So Anet made sure to include it in their living world magazine...….

Because people kept asking/talking about it. So they put it in an official source.

@NanoEliteSixSixSix.8935 said:Jormag being a dragon and all that, but Anet could still surprise usbwith a humanoid form somewhere down the line

Like they did with both Mordremoth and Kralkatorrik.

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@MrForz.1953 said:Jormag, much like every Elder Dragon is beyond everyone's comprehension. Who cares about the pronouns when it's about such an entity because you WILL miss the mark with just he, she, they, or it.

I agree and I wish they would have gone with this explanation. Unfortunately, Anet seems to want to cater to the gender theory crowd. I don't care what Jormag identifies as because self identification is often false. For example, Elizabeth Warren identified as an native American and even got preferential treatment at Harvard because of it but once the dna tests were run she was actually .098% native American. Rachel Dolezal identified herself as an African American woman and even served on the NAACP but was later found that she was not African American.

Anet, don't tell me what Jormag identifies as. Tell me what Jormag actually is.

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@Dashingsteel.3410 said:

@"Warkind.6745" said:Humanizing the elder dragons was a bad idea overall. First having them talk, and now assigning them genders has just removed any intrigue or fear of the unknown they could have inspired.

Technically, Elder Dragons were officially neither male nor female back in 2010. Before people cared about all this political view kitten.

Elder Dragons had concept of strategy and mental process since 2010. And Elder Dragons were communicating with Tyrians since 2007 (Svanir says "Hello").

BTW, making something interactive on a sapient level and having emotions is not really humanizing. There's a lot of room between "human" (both intelligent and emotional), "robot" (intelligent but emotionless), "animalistic" (emotional but non-intelligent), and "mindlessness" (neither emotional nor intelligent).

@Dashingsteel.3410 said:Can't let the story get in the way of the woke agenda....

The only reason why the Elder Dragons' gender is being brought up, is because the playerbase asked devs about it. Nothing political behind it all. But I guess that won't stop people from kitten about a non-issue.

So Anet made sure to include it in their living world magazine...….

Because people kept asking/talking about it. So they put it in an official source.

@NanoEliteSixSixSix.8935 said:Jormag being a dragon and all that, but Anet could still surprise usbwith a humanoid form somewhere down the line

Like they did with both Mordremoth and Kralkatorrik.

They are trying to normalize the term non binary

Is their something wrong with the term?I am not from the USA so I don't really know why saying non binary is such a problem.

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@yann.1946 said:

@"Warkind.6745" said:Humanizing the elder dragons was a bad idea overall. First having them talk, and now assigning them genders has just removed any intrigue or fear of the unknown they could have inspired.

Technically, Elder Dragons were officially neither male nor female back in 2010. Before people cared about all this political view kitten.

Elder Dragons had concept of strategy and mental process since 2010. And Elder Dragons were communicating with Tyrians since 2007 (Svanir says "Hello").

BTW, making something interactive on a sapient level and having emotions is not really humanizing. There's a lot of room between "human" (both intelligent and emotional), "robot" (intelligent but emotionless), "animalistic" (emotional but non-intelligent), and "mindlessness" (neither emotional nor intelligent).

@Dashingsteel.3410 said:Can't let the story get in the way of the woke agenda....

The only reason why the Elder Dragons' gender is being brought up, is because the playerbase asked devs about it. Nothing political behind it all. But I guess that won't stop people from kitten about a non-issue.

So Anet made sure to include it in their living world magazine...….

Because people kept asking/talking about it. So they put it in an official source.

@"NanoEliteSixSixSix.8935" said:Jormag being a dragon and all that, but Anet could still surprise usbwith a humanoid form somewhere down the line

Like they did with both Mordremoth and Kralkatorrik.

They are trying to normalize the term non binary

Is their something wrong with the term?I am not from the USA so I don't really know why saying non binary is such a problem.

Whew, so here's the nutshell on why the term is controversial.

Full disclosure, I may, or may not agree with the following. I'm not putting this dog in the fight for my own gain, but to explain it.

Humans, are a gender binary species, meaning the species requires two sexes for reproduction. We do not know of any gender trinary species, meaning three biological sexes are required for reproduction. And anything that does not have gender distinctions, tends to reproduce via mitosis.

So, to the left, non-binary obviously applies to the gender-norms produced by the evolution of society, which we should, of course have a choice about.

To the right, the gender-norms produced by society are a product of human evolution (or god, depending on your own personal view) and thus to claim the term non-binary in thier view is a rejection of the most basic facts of biology.

Bassicly the two sides have a different answer to the chicken or the egg question. "which came first the gender or the sex?" (don't actually answer this, we need not fight here)

The terminology is the battleground. (dumb as that sounds.) if the terms are normalized, then it becomes harder to do science. (see bill c17 from Canada... I think that's the one) if the terms are not normalized, then lots of well meaning innocent people will suffer riticule.

So the use, or lack of use, of a term like non-binary is throwing down the political gauntlet.

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Does it matter, i assume there are males and females of all species.. how else would they procreate.. Dragon Eggs remember..

@Elianora la blanche.1250 said:Jormag seems to be female and I find that pretty ironic considering how machist the Svanir's sons are ^^Which is not that surprising if you follow say the Celts were nearly all run by females.

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@BrokenGlass.9356 said:

@"Warkind.6745" said:Humanizing the elder dragons was a bad idea overall. First having them talk, and now assigning them genders has just removed any intrigue or fear of the unknown they could have inspired.

Technically, Elder Dragons were officially neither male nor female back in 2010. Before people cared about all this political view kitten.

Elder Dragons had concept of strategy and mental process since 2010. And Elder Dragons were communicating with Tyrians since 2007 (Svanir says "Hello").

BTW, making something interactive on a sapient level and having emotions is not really humanizing. There's a lot of room between "human" (both intelligent and emotional), "robot" (intelligent but emotionless), "animalistic" (emotional but non-intelligent), and "mindlessness" (neither emotional nor intelligent).

@Dashingsteel.3410 said:Can't let the story get in the way of the woke agenda....

The only reason why the Elder Dragons' gender is being brought up, is because the playerbase asked devs about it. Nothing political behind it all. But I guess that won't stop people from kitten about a non-issue.

So Anet made sure to include it in their living world magazine...….

Because people kept asking/talking about it. So they put it in an official source.

@"NanoEliteSixSixSix.8935" said:Jormag being a dragon and all that, but Anet could still surprise usbwith a humanoid form somewhere down the line

Like they did with both Mordremoth and Kralkatorrik.

They are trying to normalize the term non binary

Is their something wrong with the term?I am not from the USA so I don't really know why saying non binary is such a problem.

Whew, so here's the nutshell on why the term is controversial.

Full disclosure, I may, or may not agree with the following. I'm not putting this dog in the fight for my own gain, but to explain it.

Humans, are a gender binary species, meaning the species requires two sexes for reproduction. We do not know of any gender trinary species, meaning three biological sexes are required for reproduction. And anything that does not have gender distinctions, tends to reproduce via mitosis.

So, to the left, non-binary obviously applies to the gender-norms produced by the evolution of society, which we should, of course have a choice about.

To the right, the gender-norms produced by society are a product of human evolution (or god, depending on your own personal view) and thus to claim the term non-binary in thier view is a rejection of the most basic facts of biology.

Bassicly the two sides have a different answer to the chicken or the egg question. "which came first the gender or the sex?" (don't actually answer this, we need not fight here)

The terminology is the battleground. (dumb as that sounds.) if the terms are normalized, then it becomes harder to do science. (see bill c17 from Canada... I think that's the one) if the terms are not normalized, then lots of well meaning innocent people will suffer riticule.

So the use, or lack of use, of a term like non-binary is throwing down the political gauntlet.

So I guess if they said gender less for example their would have been no outcry.But because non binary (which would apply equally well if jormag is gender less) has a political meaning attached to it people are against it.

That seems a little silly to me but wathever I guess.

The c17 I found talked about migration so I don't really get why the exeptence of the word could make it harder to do science.Could you explain that part?Are you talking about surveys or something?

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@yann.1946 said:

@"Warkind.6745" said:Humanizing the elder dragons was a bad idea overall. First having them talk, and now assigning them genders has just removed any intrigue or fear of the unknown they could have inspired.

Technically, Elder Dragons were officially neither male nor female back in 2010. Before people cared about all this political view kitten.

Elder Dragons had concept of strategy and mental process since 2010. And Elder Dragons were communicating with Tyrians since 2007 (Svanir says "Hello").

BTW, making something interactive on a sapient level and having emotions is not really humanizing. There's a lot of room between "human" (both intelligent and emotional), "robot" (intelligent but emotionless), "animalistic" (emotional but non-intelligent), and "mindlessness" (neither emotional nor intelligent).

@Dashingsteel.3410 said:Can't let the story get in the way of the woke agenda....

The only reason why the Elder Dragons' gender is being brought up, is because the playerbase asked devs about it. Nothing political behind it all. But I guess that won't stop people from kitten about a non-issue.

So Anet made sure to include it in their living world magazine...….

Because people kept asking/talking about it. So they put it in an official source.

@"NanoEliteSixSixSix.8935" said:Jormag being a dragon and all that, but Anet could still surprise usbwith a humanoid form somewhere down the line

Like they did with both Mordremoth and Kralkatorrik.

They are trying to normalize the term non binary

Is their something wrong with the term?I am not from the USA so I don't really know why saying non binary is such a problem.

Whew, so here's the nutshell on why the term is controversial.

Full disclosure, I may, or may not agree with the following. I'm not putting this dog in the fight for my own gain, but to explain it.

Humans, are a gender binary species, meaning the species requires two sexes for reproduction. We do not know of any gender trinary species, meaning three biological sexes are required for reproduction. And anything that does not have gender distinctions, tends to reproduce via mitosis.

So, to the left, non-binary obviously applies to the gender-norms produced by the evolution of society, which we should, of course have a choice about.

To the right, the gender-norms produced by society are a product of human evolution (or god, depending on your own personal view) and thus to claim the term non-binary in thier view is a rejection of the most basic facts of biology.

Bassicly the two sides have a different answer to the chicken or the egg question. "which came first the gender or the sex?" (don't actually answer this, we need not fight here)

The terminology is the battleground. (dumb as that sounds.) if the terms are normalized, then it becomes harder to do science. (see bill c17 from Canada... I think that's the one) if the terms are not normalized, then lots of well meaning innocent people will suffer riticule.

So the use, or lack of use, of a term like non-binary is throwing down the political gauntlet.

So I guess if they said gender less for example their would have been no outcry.But because non binary (which would apply equally well if jormag is gender less) has a political meaning attached to it people are against it.

That seems a little silly to me but wathever I guess.

The c17 I found talked about migration so I don't really get why the exeptence of the word could make it harder to do science.Could you explain that part?Are you talking about surveys or something?

non binary and genderless are not the same thing...… non binary can be used as an umbrella term, encompassing many gender identities that don't fit into the male-female binary...….. genderless means the person does not identify anywhere along the male/female spectrum.

After all that, I really don't care how Jormag identifies.... I would rather know what Jormag actually is.... Male, female, hermaphrodite or asexual.

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