Honestly, cooties are a little kid's fear campaign disease that doesn't exist. It's funny when people still believe it after all this time~ It's laughable~
Are you implying that females do not harbor a disease that is unknown to medical professionals, yet is deadly to males of the species? That's a bold claim. Playground science is a highly advanced field, and has long recognized the danger posed by Cooties.
Well if seeing how anyone of a large governing body tend to lie to us, I do think it's something made up by either kids or teachers to minimize any unnecessary human contact. It would be ingenious and in some way is, though it's laughable later in life~
Nah. The government is too busy oppressing minorities and the poor to come up with something like that. I think it's just a symptom of the natural "[opposite sex] are icky" phase that kids go through.
Meh. That could be it too. Though I do think that teachers in some way play with the whole cooties thing to minimize the human contact of the opposite sex. I know the government could care less, but the school board is a governing body over school rules and activities. That's what I meant before by 'governing body'.
That is possible. Schools have gotten a lot more skittish over personal contact in recent years. Hell, a lot of schools won't even let the kids play 'Tag' anymore.
I've noticed that a lot too. Hell, the Self-Sufficiency program I went to was anal about human contact with the opposite sex. I think it's was most due to the whole sex issue, but most schools have gotten to that level of paranoia that 'children and teens will get into something worse by holding hands' *squee!*. With children, it maybe a way to quell the spread of sickness, but with teens, it's a issue with sex. So It's both frustrating and understandable at certain levels. Really I don't know anymore.
My reply to this post is late, but the thing is, you're straight up wrong, and offensive. No, it's not a game designer's job to represent anyone. However, it is absolutely necessary to properly portray LGBT characters in all media. Why? Because when we aren't represented at all, or are poorly represented, it furthers the misconception that we are unnatural, subhuman, and generally inferior beings, which is completely false and ridiculous. It's also NOT about choice. It's about being free to be who you naturally are, be that straight, gay, bi, etc., trans, cis, androgynous, etc., man, woman, etc. When any minority is not represented in media, it is easier to marginalize them and see them as some "other" worthy of your contempt and foul mouthing. Honestly, when you start cussing over a topic that's not even written in an offensive way, the only one that looks bad on is you. You're the one coming across as selfish; if you weren't, why would you care if LGBT characters are represented in video games or not? Sure some LGBT people are bad people. But so are some straight people. Every group has its bad apples. That's just a fact. But in order for people to stop this meaningless hatred (which maybe you haven't seen it as a lot of people who talk like you haven't), the ostracized group has to be recognized as being regular people. We shouldn't be defined by our LGBT parts, we should be defined by our character. The only way for that to happen is for the media to represent LGBT people as regular people. They have to be in games, movies, books, TV shows. Some of them need to be positive characters, others bad, others neutral. They need to be as commonplace in media as in real life, which is a lot more common than people think. It's necessary so that teens discovering themselves don't have to be afraid to be themselves. It's necessary so that people will be more accepting of our differences. It shouldn't matter what a person's sexuality is, but it does. And because of that, representation in widespread media is essential to ending the discrimination. In short, if you think wanting representation is ridiculous... then you know nothing about how the world works. That said, I think the gaming industry has been doing an alright job of this. As people have mentioned, Mass Effect, Dragon Age, The Sims, Skyrim, Fable, and others have had the possibility for homosexual characters for years. They do it properly, too, where it's not the defining characteristic of the characters, and is only a part of who they are. More games of this nature would be awesome to see, and I think we will be seeing more of them as times goes on.
The problem with only portraying gay people in the "proper" way is that not everyone agrees what the "proper" way is. Is it wrong to portray gay men as effeminate, even though many of them are? What about butch lesbians? Is that right or wrong? If a gay character is portrayed as promiscuous, does that encourage a positive attitude towards sexuality or promote a negative stereotype? I think the best course of action when including gay or bisexual characters is to not define the character by their sexuality, especially in the case of villainous characters. Of course, that's just my opinion.
The "proper" way is to show them as individuals, of course. It's not wrong to portray any of those things you listed, as long as that isn't the only portrayal. Some LGBT people fit into stereotypes, some do not. I agree the character should not be defined by their sexuality, as I said, they should be defined by their character, their actions, their thoughts, their belief systems, etc. Not something like skin color, sexuality, etc. We need to be shown as diversely as straight characters, and it's as simple as that.
Even as a straight person, I like how Fire Emblem Fates is taking a step in the right direction by having gay/lesbian characters that can actually marry the same sex.
