Homosexuality in the Witcher 3

[KnightofPhoenix]

Yet the whole time you avoided the Saskia element, so riding Saskia is sexist according to you, you never disapproved of that comment only about tentacles.
And this is equally ridiculous as my Kayran comment.

Oh don't worry I think it's just as ridiculous. I only used one example as I didn't want to spend the effort typing more than I had to.

the purpose of a game is to entertain , and make it possible to turn-off real world problems.

But it doesn't, and most certainly not when we are talking about a game with mature, aka real life, themes.

A game with murder, torture, rape, racism, terrorism, and so much politics it makes a political scientist wet himself is supposed to turn off real world problems? Hell no, and that's why I love this fucking game.

Repeating PC mantras,and demanding responsibility for the portrayal of a issue that is only a issue for some, without proof that even a single gay man was offended

Did you ignore the OP? Or is he supposed to prove he is gay to you?
Am I supposed to put you in contact with the people I've talked to about this scene?

I can only tell you that i have had this reception from a number of gay people. You'll have to take my word for it.

Nowhere in the Witcher world is hate crime differentiated by law. Real world doesn't belong there.

What are you talking about right now?
I am not talking about the witcher world, I am talking about players perception. Your premise that players should be so completely immersed in a game's story, or any story, that they forget the real world, is unrealistic and even undesirable as I believe art is the best and most pertinent lens through which we look at our world. It's not just mindless entertainment.

 

[AserPik]

Interesting really, since characters openly accept bisexual behavior.


e.g. "Now thats my favorite kind of magic. Lesbomancy"

 

[username_2093396]

Wow. First this, soon we will see real life dwarfs coming to forums asking CDPR to change their game, because they were offended how dwarfs treated in game ?

But the dwarves are portrayed as being awesome

I don't think anyone claimed that Henselt should have been castrated or were calling for that to be in.

I would have found it fitting and I thought he deserved it, but it didn't make sense for Roche to do that at the time he found Henselt (Henselt's army was nearby, Henselt was wearing armor, and obviously a king's death is going to be investigated so it's better not to show that the killing was personal because that could lead back to Roche and/or Ves if anyone alive knew what Henselt had done).

Even though Roche had no idea that Dethmold was raping the servant, we only find out after what Roche did. And honestly, do you think he gives a damn about that?

At the risk of generalizing, the guy on the bed simply looked like a slave (naked and malnourished). He certainly didn't look like someone who was well-taken care of by someone who loved him. If Roche saw enough to realize Dethmold was gay, then he saw enough to draw the conclusion that the guy on the bed was a slave. I see castration as a reaction to rape (it never even occurred to me to think of it as being anti-gay) so the way I saw it, Roche knows that Dethmold arranged for Ves to be raped, he walks in on what looks like Dethmold about to rape a sex slave, and he's scared about what may or may not have been done to Anais. So castration made sense as an emotional reaction against rape.

Yep, that is it. Roche is acting to exact revenge, not to mete out justice. His revenge involves maximum amount of pain and humiliation. Castration is pretty horrible, and it was used as a punishment. So unlucky Dethmold, who is also a sadist and a rapist, gets mutilated, and killed. If it were the other way around, Dethmold would have tortured Roche to death as well, castrating him in the process. So, after thinking about this scene for a while, I do not see any hidden meaning behind it. Dethmold met his match, and got butchered. End of story.

Exactly.

I also felt unease about Dethmold scene. But it does make sense in game. CDPR did not intend to hurt anybody's feelings, and now it is already a done deal. The game is terrific, even if some scenes may be perceived as offensive by some people. I would think after reading these posts CDPR will take yours and other similar points of view into consideration. I just hope you won't count this scene against the entire game.

I agree. There were a lot of scenes in the game that made me feel uncomfortable (Loredo tying Ves up, Henselt raping Ves, seeing Roche get so vicious when he killed Dethmold, seeing Phillipa lose her eyes, seeing that mage get a stake shoved up his ass in the epilogue, etc.). But the scenes made sense in the context they were shown, and I think the game would have had much less impact if those scenes were removed.

In medieval Europe ,when thief was caught , his hand was cut off. In pagan "Poland" people were nailing captured rapists to a tree (their genitals) and gave them a dull knife ,they had a "choice" .....no matter if raped person was a man or woman
Cruel Times indeed .
Roche wanted to kill Mr.D and before that he wanted to "remove" tool used to commit crime.

Exactly. And now I'm thinking of Sin City "I removed his weapons...both of them..."

B: a lot of people said roche based everything he did just on dethmolds crimes. his sexuality doesn't matter at all. i'm asking myself then: why is this character trait of him even introduced so late in the game, if it adds nothing to the character or his interaction with other characters? if it serves no purpose? why are we shown that he is gay if it really doesn't matter?

I was pretty sure Dethmold was gay kind of early in Chapter 2. It felt to me like he was flirting with Geralt, so I wasn't surprised at all when it was confirmed later on that he was gay. I was mainly surprised at the raping (intentionally setting Ves up to get raped, and then possibly having a sex slave) since I never figured Dethmold for a rapist so that surprised me. But on the plus side, during that scene I was thinking, "Oh good, he is gay so I guess that means he didn't rape Anais."

I'm not sure that's strictly true. Dethmold may be the only gay male (and if you think it isn't revealed until this late, you haven't been paying attention to him), but there are monstrous straight males (Loredo and Henselt), a notorious lesbian (Philippa), some sympathetic bi females (Margot and Derae), and a bit of satire on male voyeurs ("my favorite kind of magic, lesbomancy").

I think the Witcher series has a lot to say about thinking with parts of your anatomy that aren't known for first-class rational thought, and this is inevitably going to expose the willingness of some of us to take offense.

Exactly, very well said

 

[vivaxardas2015]

Well, after I thought about it I decided that this scene was in line with Roche's character, state of mind and motifs. Also Dethmold's alternative death by beheading was not humiliating, but very dignified. So I do not see any hidden anti-gay agenda behind Roche scene.

Problem may be with the structure of this scene. It is a common fallacy to see events happening right after other events as connected by cause and effect. Dethomld presented as gay who is also a (probable) rapist is followed by him castrated. As a matter of psychology people connect this as cause and effect, and the ones who are sensitive to this issue, feel offended. Even the ones who are not still get the same impression, and as on one of forums I browsed cheer Roche - that gay pig got what he deserved. So if to think about it, such reaction is predictable. I do not believe that it was done intentionally by the reasons I mentioned above, even though it can be used in story-telling. So if we move past this conjunction of Dethmold conversation scene, and his castration scene, and make an effort not to see it as implying any causation, we can see that from storytelling perspective Roche's behavior was completely in line with his character.

But people do feel offended, and it is a good idea to take this fact into consideration. While I always against censorship, some sort of self-constraint and evaluation of possible psychological effects are in order for any developer. But it is only for CDPR to decide.

 

[GuyNwah]

I'm certain that devs had no intention of portraying homosexuality good or bad because they believe good or bad does not exist at all. (you can see this embedded within TW1 and TW2)

I don't think that's true. I think the games are a strong statement of how difficult it is to be truly moral. They're not neutral or dismissive of good or bad at all. They despair of the ability of human, elf, or dwarf to discern what is really good in a world where no matter whether you're noble or rebel or witcher, somebody is ploughing you. They show the impossibility of telling what is really evil when evil rapes the world while wrapping itself in flags and laws and institutions.

 

[HylianColibri]

I don't think that's true. I think the games are a strong statement of how difficult it is to be truly moral. They're not neutral or dismissive of good or bad at all. They despair of the ability of human, elf, or dwarf to discern what is really good in a world where no matter whether you're noble or rebel or witcher, somebody is ploughing you. They show the impossibility of telling what is really evil when evil rapes the world while wrapping itself in flags and laws and institutions.

They try to show how blurred the line between good and evil is.

 

[username_2093396]

But people do feel offended, and it is a good idea to take this fact into consideration. While I always against censorship, some sort of self-constraint and evaluation of possible psychological effects are in order for any developer. But it is only for CDPR to decide.

Yeah, I would agree with that too. I'm sure they didn't intend the scene to be homophobic and I don't think it was either, but in general if a scene is unintentionally ambiguous then maybe some subtle changes should have been made to get the intended meaning across more clearly (and I mean "should" from the point of view of making the story better, not demanding changes or censorship).

I love TW2 but it has a few ambiguities that I don't think were intentional and I wish had been more clear. The most annoying one for me is when Geralt says Ves is lying and then that goes absolutely nowhere and Ves completely drops out of the story. Why have Geralt say that without Roche commenting on it and eliciting further discussion of what Geralt meant?

I think he meant that she was hesitant to plainly state that she was raped, but I've seen people interpret it in a completely different way, like Ves was working for Henselt or something, and I really think that they shouldn't have included that line unless it was supposed to be some kind of nagging foreshadowing for TW3.

So if other people have different parts of the story that they think were unintentionally vague and should have been a little more clear then fair enough

 

[GuyNwah]

They try to show how blurred the line between good and evil is.

That's saying what I tried to say, in a much greater economy of words.

But I'm not sure the line is blurred, it's that the more we think we know what is good or what is evil, the more likely we are wrong. The more we are certain we know where the line is, the more it is certain that it is not there.

 

[vivaxardas2015]

Yeah, I would agree with that too. I'm sure they didn't intend the scene to be homophobic and I don't think it was either, but in general if a scene is unintentionally ambiguous then maybe some subtle changes should have been made to get the intended meaning across more clearly (and I mean "should" from the point of view of making the story better, not demanding changes or censorship).

I love TW2 but it has a few ambiguities that I don't think were intentional and I wish had been more clear. The most annoying one for me is when Geralt says Ves is lying and then that goes absolutely nowhere and Ves completely drops out of the story. Why have Geralt say that without Roche commenting on it and eliciting further discussion of what Geralt meant?

I think he meant that she was hesitant to plainly state that she was raped, but I've seen people interpret it in a completely different way, like Ves was working for Henselt or something, and I really think that they shouldn't have included that line unless it was supposed to be some kind of nagging foreshadowing for TW3.

So if other people have different parts of the story that they think were unintentionally vague and should have been a little more clear then fair enough />/>

Yeah, with Ves it was probably intentional, with some pay-off in TW3. If they drop this arc completely, it would be pretty bad from story-telling perspective. Dethmold told that Henselt could get his little unicorns if he were to find a strong woman. Well, he got one, but, unfortunately, he did not ask her nicely. For many people it cost him a dagger in the guts. Given Geralt's strange remark about Ves lying, there is more to the story, and we have to see it in TW3.

 

[Aditya]

And 21 pages already? should even I dare ask what did I miss?

 

[username_2093396]

Yeah, with Ves it was probably intentional, with some pay-off in TW3. If they drop this arc completely, it would be pretty bad from story-telling perspective. Dethmold told that Henselt could get his little unicorns if he were to find a strong woman. Well, he got one, but, unfortunately, he did not ask her nicely. For many people it cost him a dagger in the guts. Given Geralt's strange remark about Ves lying, there is more to the story, and we have to see it in TW3.

I thought Sile said that, but anyway That did cross my mind as a possible motivation for Henselt, but considering how desperate he was for a kid I don't think he'd leave Ves behind free and unguarded if he thought she might be pregnant with his child.

Even if the conspiracy theory is true that Ves was an accomplice (which I don't believe) why would Henselt trust her to not turn his heir over to another ruler like how he got Anais? I think it's possible that Sile's spell worked and Ves might be pregnant with the heir to Kaedwen, but I don't think that was Henselt's plan.

I think Henselt probably assumed Sile didn't do what she said because he doesn't trust sorceresses and he raped Ves because he was on a power trip and didn't believe any woman would really refuse him (at least that's what I got out of his dialogue when Geralt challenges him about why he did it).

 

[vivaxardas2015]

I thought Sile said that, but anyway />/>/> That did cross my mind as a possible motivation for Henselt, but considering how desperate he was for a kid I don't think he'd leave Ves behind free and unguarded if he thought she might be pregnant with his child.

Even if the conspiracy theory is true that Ves was an accomplice (which I don't believe) why would Henselt trust her to not turn his heir over to another ruler like how he got Anais? I think it's possible that Sile's spell worked and Ves might be pregnant with the heir to Kaedwen, but I don't think that was Henselt's plan.

I think Henselt probably assumed Sile didn't do what she said because he doesn't trust sorceresses and he raped Ves because he was on a power trip and didn't believe any woman would really refuse him (at least that's what I got out of his dialogue when Geralt challenges him about why he did it).

Well, Dethmold told Triss about this Sile's plan. Yes, it is very unclear, I just want make some sense out of this rather strange Geralt's remark. There were bunch of soldiers outside we had to kill in order to get to the tent. So they may have guarded Ves, for all we know. In this case Henselt did not just let her go - she was still in the tent, after all. But all of it is highly speculative.

 

[username_2093396]

Well, Dethmold told Triss about this Sile's plan. Yes, it is very unclear, I just want make some sense out of this rather strange Geralt's remark. There were bunch of soldiers outside we had to kill in order to get to the tent. So they may have guarded Ves, for all we know. In this case Henselt did not just let her go - she was still in the tent, after all. But all of it is highly speculative.

Yeah, that's true. I'm hoping this will get cleared up in TW3 and I really want to see Ves again, but at the same time I'm slightly afraid of the possibility that there's a plot twist that ruins her for me like how everything after the Draug fight ruined Dethmold for me.

At least in his case it was pretty obvious he'd work against Geralt and/or Roche at some point so it wasn't unexpected even if I was hoping it wouldn't happen anyway. But with Ves there's nothing in her personality to indicate anything like that, just the odd line from Geralt that could mean anything.

 

[triptrap]

Well, after I thought about it I decided that this scene was in line with Roche's character, state of mind and motifs. Also Dethmold's alternative death by beheading was not humiliating, but very dignified. So I do not see any hidden anti-gay agenda behind Roche scene.

Problem may be with the structure of this scene. It is a common fallacy to see events happening right after other events as connected by cause and effect. Dethomld presented as gay who is also a (probable) rapist is followed by him castrated. As a matter of psychology people connect this as cause and effect, and the ones who are sensitive to this issue, feel offended. Even the ones who are not still get the same impression, and as on one of forums I browsed cheer Roche - that gay pig got what he deserved. So if to think about it, such reaction is predictable. I do not believe that it was done intentionally by the reasons I mentioned above, even though it can be used in story-telling. So if we move past this conjunction of Dethmold conversation scene, and his castration scene, and make an effort not to see it as implying any causation, we can see that from storytelling perspective Roche's behavior was completely in line with his character.

But people do feel offended, and it is a good idea to take this fact into consideration. While I always against censorship, some sort of self-constraint and evaluation of possible psychological effects are in order for any developer. But it is only for CDPR to decide.

very well said, and i agree wholeheartedly

 

[M4xw0lf.978]

(...) on one of forums I browsed cheer Roche - that gay pig got what he deserved.(...)

The exact reason, why the scene annoys me. If openly gay-hating people are celebrating the scene, something IS wrong.
So we all agree that CDPR has no duty to cater to the tastes of homosexual gamers, by display of heroic, ethical gay characters - but the same must hold true for the other extreme, i.e., nothing in the game should give someone the opportunity to say "that gay pig got what he deserved".
And I'm strongly convinced that by simply slitting Dethmolds throat, such homophobic outbursts would not be promoted, at least not to the same extent. And even the ball-cutting business would still be okay to me, if it were not left uncommented.

As a thought experiment (and purely playing devils advocate,) for all those who are saying we as heterosexual males might not notice any problems with the scene because of our privilege, is it possible that you who do notice problems with it are overreacting and seeing a problem where none exists, perhaps because you're used to campaigning on these subjects in other forums and real life?

Not flamebaiting or anything just asking whether this might be a possibility.

As a thought experiment, is it possible that those of us heterosexual males, who don't notice problems with the scene, do not want to see it, because they do not wish to concern themselves with the existing problem of gay discrimination, perhaps because they also don't want to question their own attitude towards the topic?
Just asking whether this might be a possibility.

Cue Slimgrin.

 

[sfinx]

I hope, W3 will not revolve around this problem.

Philippa is (at least for me) good homosexual charcter. Read the books and you will learn what are her goals and maybe you will like her more (in game she doesn't have any time to explain herself). Also Ciri has no problem with homosexual (but also heterosexual) relation-ships.

And I think, those two examples are enough for this world. 'Medieval' world is not good place for some homosexual fight for equality.

nothing in the game should give someone the opportunity to say "that gay pig got what he deserved".

Why not? You have the same oportunity with heterosexual Henselt, so there is equality in game, you can say there is a gay pig and hetero pig

 

[jerf.674]

Because the castration / homosexuality combo (among other factors like Geralt's silence, and the jokes) can be perceived as being homophobic.

But why is it bad to have homophobic characters in this kind of setting? To repeat it once again, this is _dark fantasy_, the society is modeled upon the real world Middle Ages society, which was _very_ homophobic and misogynistic by modern standards. To faithfully reproduce this society, there should necessary be these elements, and I don't get why the devs should shy away from this.

 

[blueteainfusion]

I hope, W3 will not revolve around this problem.

Philippa is (at least for me) good homosexual charcter. Read the books and you will learn what are her goals and maybe you will like her more (in game she doesn't have any time to explain herself). Also Ciri has no problem with homosexual (but also heterosexual) relation-ships.

And I think, those two examples are enough for this world. 'Medieval' world is not good place for some homosexual fight for equality.

It's not about a fight for equality in-game. For those 22 pages, we've been talking about the scene on the meta-level. I don't want to repeat what was said here numerous times by more articulate people than me, but you have no problem with things like rasism, gender equality and other modern concepts touched upon in the world. Suddenly you think that homophobia is too much? It's a post-modern setting, I think all difficult topics were fair game. If the characters can discuss these things, I assume that we, as an audience, are more than justified having lengthy conversations about other real life concerns that can be applied to the story.

But why is it bad to have homophobic characters in this kind of setting? To repeat it once again, this is _dark fantasy_, the society is modeled upon the real world Middle Ages society, which was _very_ homophobic and misogynistic by modern standards. To faithfully reproduce this society, there should necessary be these elements, and I don't get why the devs should shy away from this.

But what we are criticizing is the reaction the characters have to these acts of prejudice. Geralt is against your medival sexism. He hates rasism (even if it is its fantastic counterpart). He generally judges people not by who they are but for what they do, and it's fair. But he didn't say a word to Roche about all this. Even if we assume that Roche is indeed a homophobic prick, I just wanted a confirmation that no, Geralt does not condone such sentiments. Even if the killing itself stayed unchanged, it would be much better if he commented on it. Then I'd be sure that the unfortunate implications were just a accident on devs' part.

Why not? You have the same oportunity with heterosexual Henselt, so there is equality in game, you can say there is a gay pig and hetero pig />/>

As KoP has already repeated, it's not even remotely the same situation. And even assuming it was, than the punishement should fit the crime. Dethmold was punished, as many defenders of the scene argue, for enabling the rape of Ves (and the murder of The Blue Stripes) - these were not acts typical of homosexual man. But while Henselt, who actually did the deed, was punished in a relatively neutral way, regardless of his sexuality, Dethmold was killed in highly emasculating way. So no, there is no equality in the game in this case.

 

[GSoda.43]

Personally I don't mind any possible implementation of gay characters, be they male or female, in TW3. As long as CDPR doesn't go the BW way. Don't retcon established characters. Don't put them in there "just because"...and over all: don't make any possible flings player-sexual (though there's small chance of that in TW).

 

[Babli.480]

And 21 pages already? should even I dare ask what did I miss?

People reading too much into things in videogame.

Everytime I see thread like this I just hope that CDPR doesnt care and continues on what they do.