Link Between Genders

At E3 this month, Nintendo released the first images for the new Legend of Zelda game, and while it made me question every choice in my life that did not lead to me playing that exact game this very moment, it also raised another question.

"Hey... is Link a girl in that video?"

Not just in the sense that yes, haha, Link is no slate chested, grizzled white guy with a five o'clock shadow and probably a dark past (like every other main character at E3), instead he's usually under powered for his enemies, and tends to be a bit more... feminine.

Which if you're playing the home game, being less manly than a man who's pecs require zip codes, makes you about normal.

No, the question came about with the art, the motion of his body, the different angles of the face... all seemed to point that "he" might be a "her" this time around.

Now, Nintendo did point out that "Link is a guy in this", but the question had already been asked: why not?  Link is probably one of the most easily identifiable characters in video game history, and certainly one of the easiest for players to identify with.  Unlike many protagonists in games, Link works for both genders.

Take the very first Zelda, Link was a blank slate.  Mega Man at that time, was a person with a story behind him.  He was "Rock", a robot made by Dr. Light, who had a "strong sense of Justice" and took to becoming a warrior to save the day.  That's four more points than Link got.  Link was literally "just a guy, basically you".  Link was not a destined hero, he was not a master of all things.  His motivations, history, and all else were up to the player.  He saved Zelda because the player wanted to save Zelda.

Flash forward a few years, and we have "Ocarina of Time" wherein Link is... a kid, living in a forest.  His history is really not given.  He doesn't have a fairy, but wait... he gets one.  His character arch is that Link is summoned by the Deku tree, that's it.  There's no "Link must learn to be a hero", as it's pretty damn obvious for everyone he knows in the forest; Link is already a stand-up guy everyone but one of them is fine with.  There's no vengeance, there's no "I am fated to save the world!"  Link just goes off to save the world because the player wants to help.

All the way through the series, Link is a rather androgynous character.  He pushes no gender boundaries, he exemplifies no stereotypes.  This is likely one of the reasons the bulk of the gamers I know (male and female) have an affection for this game: we're not playing "Link" we're playing "us in a green outfit".

How many female Link's go to conventions?  Less than the amount of girls I've known who love Link as a character, someone they can identify with.  As a guy, I can't identify with Ivy, the bondage assassin lady from Soul Caliber, nor half of the DoA cast.  Playing a shape shifting witch who walks around in vinyl outfits made of hair, is not something I can see myself as.  I can't find myself absorbed into this characters life.

But as a scared, lonely person trapped on an island of savages all trying to murder the hell out of me?  Well, I'm sure Laura Croft and I would have a lot in common on the "oh God I'm going to die" mentalities.  I can see many a young girl sitting before a TV, asking themselves the question as to "why is Link saving Zelda?"  It's not because he loves her, in many cases, he's never met her.  It's not because Ganon killed his wife and kids.  He doesn't have to do anything actually, Link has all the ability to literally peace out of Hyrule forever.

Link fights Ganon, and saves Zelda because he wants to.  It's the easiest motivation to get behind.  We as gamers want to fight to save something, and beat back the tides of evil forces, and honestly, we don't care about what the hero wears under the armor.

The industry needs to stop pretending like we do.

The Worst Defence is a Good Offence.

Offence is one of those things that people take, but never want.  Well, some people want to be offended, it's like candy for bitches.  We've all met someone who enjoys nothing more than meeting someone who's opinion differs from them drastically, because in that moment they get to shout.

They do not get to "discuss" or "educate", no, they simply want to have a reason to be very loud about something they like to think they know about.

Since blogs are nothing more than soapboxes, here's mine:

You should deeply care about if you offend someone, even if you hate them.

Offending someone is not a good thing, the exact meaning of the word negates it as being something to be proud of.  Too many times I have to sit through an entire media feed, filled with posts and pages about how "I DON'T CARE IF THIS OFFENDS YOU!" or "if this offends you, you can fuck right off."

It's trolling, on a more personal level.  Akin to saying "u mad?" after doing something with the intention of making someone angry.  It creates a situation where you have trapped someone into either feeling the intended, ambushed emotion, or lying about how they're a Zen master.

There are likely no Zen masters anywhere near anyone reading anything on Facebook.  Unless you are taking a selfie with the Dali Lama, you've never met one.

Say you don't believe in "God" or any "gods", so you're an atheist.  Now, if you just don't believe because of reasons, that's fine, the only people who really care likely won't waste their time on you.  Though, if you want attention, you can be a militant atheist.  You can post demeaning things about other people, call them idiots, tell them horrible things, insult every aspect of their intellect, and then, after all of it you can just scoff at them for being offended.  It's fine, because only stupid people would be offended for it.

It makes you sound smarter, to dismiss other people, just like pushing someone makes you seem stronger. 

Fun Fact: Scientologists schools spend all day copying words out of the dictionary, which means that their children will grow up having a vocabulary that will dwarf every one of their peers.  They may not have the actual schooling to back it up, but they will speak in words that make "smart folks" feel like "dumb folks".  It's very much like what most atheists do today.

Now, I'm beating up on atheists, and I don't mean to. To be perfectly honest, I don't care if you're an atheist.  I don't care if you literally believe in the Flying Speghetti Monster.  In all honesty, I have never cared about religion, I care about actions.

Believe me, I have strong opinions, ones I will defend, but I will not defend them by offending others.  If you truly want to have strong opinions, you have to learn to explain and defend them while not hurting someone's feelings.  We tend to diminish that, making "hurting your little feelings" into an insult all on its' own.  Remember, suicide and murder both happen because of hurt feelings.  Wars as well.

To offend while speaking your opinion, ruins your opinion's merit, for example:

"Them niggers and faggots ain't too bad."

Well, that sentence is going to offend someone.  Rightly so, because it's goddamn offensive.  Even though it's merit is "these people are good", it's delivery negates that.  The speaker might really care about the rights of those people, to their very core... but who's going to take that?  Even if you agree with them, you're going to feel insulted, and you might even repremand them for it.  Imagine that, you're repremanding someone for voicing an opinion of tolerance and understanding.  Why?  U Mad?

Voicing one's opinion should only be done to educate others to the merits of one's opinion.  If done in a way that rebukes the exact people one is trying to educate, it's not "voicing an opinion" it's "being a massive dickhead."  No one ever says "Hitler was bad", because it's a damned given at this point.  Yes, we're well aware extermination of a people is wrong.  No one would say, to a group of their friends "Hitler is a fucking monster, and you guys are fucking shits if you think otherwise, and if you're offended by this, you can go fuck yourself." 

No one speaks to their friends like that, they don't need to.  Their friends likely either know, or even if they did not, yelling at them and threatening insult is only going to convince your friends you're an asshole.  If you said that line to a person who had never heard of Hitler, you're not going to convince them. 

If you're intention in voicing your opinion is not to educate those who might not fully understand, but to exclude those who may disagree with you, you are not voicing an opinion.  In this, you are secluding yourself from other opinions, so you may listen to your opinions echo.  A person who argues with his echo, is a moron.

#YESALLTHETHINGS

An odd thing in my life has always been that I don't understand my fellow males.  Out of the friends I acquire in my travels, few are guys.  I don't mesh well with my own gender. 

Put me at work, I'll have a great time with the women.  We'll tell jokes, swap stories, be morons at play. 

The guys will sort of... acknowledge me.

I like girls, and not just the drooling staring way.  I enjoy spending time in groups of women.  On my birthday, I ended up having long conversations with two fifteen year old girls.  One was about dying because the vacuum exploded and killed us with bright sparkly stars, and the other was about boyfriends and tennis.

Seriously, it's not even me creeping on young girls, I just find these things funny. 

In school, I sat at the "girls" table for most of my life.  I only left when I made a single guy friend who wanted to move, and a few of the girls followed.  A few of the guys I knew figured out this magical talent I had for simply speaking to girls, and quickly recruited me.  By the way, guys table conversation was usually them pretending to be as stupid as possible, as to not be "smart".  Girls table conversation was about sex, how to do it, what they thought would be fun, and that guy who's shorts showed off his junk in gym class.

Girl talk was never about ponies, unless that was slang for some horrifying sex act.

I enjoyed those days, and I remember thinking to myself when I joined the "guys"; this lot has literally no idea what the hell the other side is.  The notion that girls could think was beyond most of them.  It was not some form of anti-women hate, but mostly pure ignorance.  They were guys, guys talked about cars, how tough they were, and made vague attempts to show they noticed girls.

There's so many problems with that mentality, because it leads to a constant surprise set up later on.
"Whoa, this girl knows about something I like..."
"Whoa, this girl can do things I do..."
"Whoa, this girl doesn't like something I don't..."

You like giant robot movies, because they're awesome.  You can ride a dirt bike, because dirt bikes are fun.  You don't like bad romance movies, because they suck.  It should not surprise you that someone else might feel the same way, just because they're a different gender.  This creates a rift, it leaves people believing they're different on a base level.

I've taught young girls to protect themselves, because the world has plenty of people who'll harm them for no reason.  I taught young boys for the exact same reasons.  Some people just hate women, because some people are fucking stupid.  A similar amount of men are attacked and beaten because someone hated them.  We're not unique in this.  Bad things happen regardless of gender.

Instead of putting women on this alter where we proclaim we'll protect them, why don't we put everyone up on that alter?  Why don't we teach children to not be shitheads when they grow up?  Teach them not to beat their spouses, because 40% of domestic abuse is against the man, and that doesn't include the men that are either ashamed to report it, or who literally don't know they can be abused.

Imagine if a woman did not know rape was wrong, and just something she hated, but oh well, these things happen?  Boys are told to never hit girls, I know grown men who still act like even trying to stop a woman from assaulting them with a weapon is wrong.  I watched a guy get beaten up in school because a girl just wanted to, and no one would let him live it down if he did anything.  That sort of mentality creates a feeling of powerlessness that festers, and eventually grows into a hatred of those that hold it over you. 

If girls could beat you up when you were younger because they felt like it, how hard is it to believe they wouldn't falsely accuse you of assault when you're older, because they feel like it?  You remember that feeling of injustice, where they hurt you in some way, and the world laughed when it happened, and then shamed you for even thinking of defending yourself.

... and they wonder where a "rape culture" comes from. 

By teaching this to young boys, we practically groom many of them to fear and resent girls.  To expect a woman to abuse power of them.  We spend hours telling a boy to never lay hand on a girl, but spare the girl a passing "don't hit him either".  Children are shits, they'll abuse any power you give them (seriously, tell a child it's ok not to like a kind of food, and they hate everything), we train girls to use this against boys... but the girls can grow out of that power.

Sure some don't, some just become horrible people, but that's just the world: some people suck.  It's these boys that still hurt.  Victory is easily forgotten as the real world sets in, but injustice festers.  Adults push this on the young, and punish them accordingly.  They create a future for the boys where they fear and resent women, and a world where women have to wonder if behind each face is a little boy who hates girls.  Is that smile hiding the time a girl abused him?  Was his father beaten by his mother?  Does he view her as a "thing" because he spent his life being told she was different?

If you want to fix the problem women face today, because they face a hell not of their own making, you have to start with the kids.  Tell them that abusing each other is not acceptable.  That they're people, regardless of gender.  Teach them real respect, not the kind that comes due to "oh, they're just too weak...", but the sort where they understand that we're all weak and strong. 

Teach your little boy to think little girls are awesome, and your little girl the same, and you might not have to watch another generation pass by in a world where either of them can have their lives ripped away because of something you did.

Annoying...

Things that Annoy Me: A look at the world of frustration.

We all have things that annoy us, and we share many of them.  No one likes racists, no one likes sitting in traffic, everyone hates people who talk during the movie.  There are, however, some things that we hate as individuals.  To quote Leonard Church:

" It's not about hating the guy on the other side because someone told you to. I mean, you should hate someone because they're an asshole, or pervert, or snob, or they're lazy, or arrogant, or an idiot, or a know-it-all. Those are reasons to dislike somebody. You don't hate a person because someone told you to. You have to learn to despise them on a personal level. Not because they're Red, or Blue, but because you know them, and you see them every single day, and you can't stand them because they are a complete and total fucking douche bag."

So, a small list of things that make me want to hit people with old pieces of fish:

-Anyone who dismisses actual science, because they don't like being wrong.

-People who expect people on minimum wage to care if they do a good job.  Remember, you get what you pay for.

-Ex/Current Military who's sole fix for any situation is "you should join the military, they'll do X".  Healthcare, college, job training, sex.  I know a lot of military personel, one thing all of the ones I like have in common; they don't expect everyone's life to be better with a liberal application of "go across the world, stand somewhere and wait to be shot at".

-Clerks in Loan offices.

-Anyone for whom "I don't know" is not an acceptable answer.

-Anyone who complains that movies based on books do some things different.

-Movies that "based on the book", the way Fast and Furious is "based loosely on Ben Hurr"...

-The Phrase "U mad bro?".

-"Extended Universes", I'm looking at you Boba Fanboys.

-People who make popcorn at work.  You will either burn it, and make everyone hate you, or you will make it correctly, and make everyone unsatisfiably crave popcorn for the next few hours.

-My Xbox.

-Zimbo Quizes.

There's more, but this list is now one this list.

The Dark Warrior

In my life, I'm not particularly afraid of fighting anyone.  Anxious, nervous, even worried, but fear isn't exactly the emotion I feel.  In the end, I want to fight them, even if I know I'll lose.  Sometimes I prefer to fight those that I'll lose to.

There is, however, one person I do fear to cross with; that is me.

Not my actual self, but a deeper, darker me that I have to explain in the only way I can: with metaphors.

In the Legend of Zelda, Link fights Dark Link, a representation of everything that makes him unworthy of being the hero.  For those of you who don't obsess over video games, Dark Link is literally your character, but shaded black.  All the same power ups, all the same hearts, everything.  Dark Link also has the same style, but one exception: he can counter every straight attack you make at him.  To beat him, you have to fight in odd patterns, and generally find the weakspot in your own play style to even hit him.

This is how I see my depression, as this Dark Link inside me.

It's something that's incredibly difficult to fight, for a few painful reasons.  Firstly, it knows every one of my tricks.  It knows all of my mental blocks, my uplifting habits, my ways of fighting through depression.  It knows them all.  It also knows my weaknesses.  Every chink in my armor, every spot where it hurts, it knows exactly how to hit me there.

It knows what to do, and when the perfect time to do it is.  Unfortunately, I don't know it as well as it knows me.  It knows my subconscious, while I can only guess at its'.

Worst of all, it has no need to hold anything back.  Nothing is too far for it, nothing is too wrong.  It will do anything to win.  It wants me alone and it wants me defeated.  It has all the time in the world to do both.  It holds every card, it has every advantage.

I cannot grow stronger, since it grows with me.  Should I learn a new method, it learns it as well, and it learns to break it.  There is no defeating it.  I will spend the rest of my life in perpetual conflict with it, and I can never defeat it.  I can't kill it, I can't be rid of it.  I'll hold it until I die.

... but that's the thing, I don't have to carry it, I don't have to drag it along with me.  It comes willingly.  When all is said and done, my darkness will still be willing to stand beside me, and tell me I'm a failure.  It will never give up.

In that, it can be my greatest ally.

Through it, I will constantly learn my weaknesses, and to better guard them.  I will learn it's secrets as well, it's methods, how it got to me, and be stronger for it. It may be willing to go further than me, but I'm willing to challenge it every time.  It cannot be stronger than me, it can only be as strong as it's possible for me to be.  It's the constant challenge of my life, the ever lasting wind in my face.

Our greatest fight, is the one with those near us.  I have the advantage of outside allies, I can find help.  I can have someone stand behind me and push, it cannot.  All it can do is try and get them to abandon me, and it knows just how to do that.  A counter for every counter, it can be unstoppable.

So, I make it work for me, I focus it's efforts into books, into stories, into my desire to conquer.   One day, I will stand atop the mountain, with the world at my feet, and that damnedable Dark Me will be standing next to me.  Which is good...

... because I'll want him there so I can say "I told you so" to his face.

Thought Process.

The creation of a story is simple, but complex in its' design.  To write a good, thought provoking story, one must use two important mental phrases.

"Imagine that..." and "take into consideration".

For an example, we'll put them into Jurassic Park:

Jurassic Park (in case you just fell to earth from Mars), is a movie in which a genetics company develops a way to clone dinosaurs in present times.  Awesome.  Their first step is to make an amusement park so everyone can see them.  Things go bad, everyone dies, and then it happens two more times.

Take into consideration, that the company Ingen that Hammond runs, is actually the good guys in the story.  In the background is this shady, evil company, that ruthlessly murders people to get their hands on the dna for the dinosaurs.  It doesn't work in the end, but who says that's the end?  Since it's obvious that the world finds out about it, and then, in movie two, we see them rear up again to steal a T-rex.

But... that's where things get... odd.

Remember, on the ship, everyone was ripped apart, but a creature that was in no way a t-rex.  It is an impossibility, that a t-rex, while locked up in cargo, was able to get out and kill people in their bunks, or in the ships control room.  Seriously, someone had to either sneak raptors on the ship, or someone went ninja on them and blamed "creatures".

Imagine that it's all part of the plan.  That evil shadow company from the first film, is intentionally releasing a t-rex into the general public.  Just a regular, t-rex, not one genetically modified to have lasers or anything special.  Look at the havoc and destruction it does.  That seems less like a accident, and more like a trial run.  Can you imagine weaponizing a t-rex?

Now, take into consideration that they can clone dinosaurs, why not humans?  They show it in their little movie.  Is it possible they can clone people with their memories intact?  (Like how Hammond and others die in the first book, but are there in the second?)  If they can do that, how many times could they have done it?  Could they have used it as a test run?

Imagine that they didn't just select the people from the first movie at random, they grabbed people that Hammond had complete access to: his two kids (one well educated in dinosaurs, the other a 90s hacking wizard), two experts in that field (both also in good physical condition), and a brilliant... guy?  Also an Aussie hunter (Australian is practically a military rank), big bad asses from all over... and toss them into this "park".  Clone them, and run it again, like a simulation.

Then, Phase Two: Lost World, they send them to an isle with military structures, and send teams specifically designed to fight dinos... only to watch them get demolished by nature.  How many times did they run that test?

Take into consideration, that this Shadow Corp wants this.  They want the money, the power, the ability to create giant monsters.  Why though?  Why go through all this trouble?  Unless they're smarter than we thought...

Imagine if in the first movie, it's all already happened as the book said it did.  The people who died, died, the people who lived, lived... but the Shadow Corp actually did get what they needed. So they run simulations to test it, over and over... the bodies were likely still there on the isle, in one form or another, and all the dinos are dead from that contingency plan.

Imagine if... the Shadow Corp owned Hammond the whole time.  They let him build up this image of being "the leader", and then let him take the fall at the end of the Lost World.  Now he's gone, and they've still got all they need: all the facilities to breed dinos, governments begging for giant war monsters, the ability to clone anyone,  and they get to have the profits of Disney while they do it.

They've won so hard, it's hardly a challenge.  They're beyond supervillains at this time.  They're monetary gods.

Now... imagine what you'd have to do to stop them..

Goddamn Morons...

Sometimes, even the smartest character becomes a massive idiot for the sake of lazy writing.  It's goddamn annoying to watch a person who just solved a mystery, stand with their back to the man who "kills people with hidden knives" for a full minute while the hero explains that no one else but he knows about it.

Even in good stories, sometimes people just utterly fail at basic survival instinct.  I sometimes wonder if characters in these worlds accidentally eat plates because they forgot where food ended.  Here are some of my worst offenders.

Defiance:
(mild spoilers here, it doesn't amount to much in the show)
Quentin finds the knot that his brother was killed over, then, a man shows up to his house and tries to kill him over it.  Then, the boss of that man, shows up at his house, causes hell, and leaves with the INCREDIBLY CRYPTIC "if you want to know what happened to your mother, come find me".  Like a sudden idiot he does...
This is where he fails every "sense motive" and "intelligence" check his DM asked for.
He meets her, and she will only tell him if he gives her the knot... so he does.  She then spins this long tale about his mother... and he believes her, and leaves her there.  Why?  Seriously now... this woman is evil, she lies professionally, why would he believe a single word that came out of her?
Also in the list of "idiot moves" he leaves her with the knot... he doesn't even try to take it back.  She's what, 70?  Has breathing problems? Can barely walk?  He killed a man in a fist fight, after being hit with a tazer.  There is no way he should let her leave with it.  She can't even say anything out loud, because she doesn't want anyone to know of this things existence.

The man could have pulled it back off the table, and walked out of the restaurant, and dared her to limp after him.  I'd of tossed in something like "thanks for agreeing to speak at my sisters wedding!" just to leave her unable to reply.

Queen City police don't understand criminals:
Arrow is a great show, lots of fun, clever bits in it... then police tend to be morons.  No wonder no one has figured out that the mysterious man with skills that come from years of survival in a harsh land, might be the man who came back the same day the vigilante appeared, is covered in combat scars, and survived in a harsh land for years.  It would be too obvious if the same man had a near limitless fortune which allowed him to pay for any of the severely high tech tools needed for hunting criminals at night.

Besides the point.

Every time the police capture a criminal, and hold them at gunpoint, they approach them slowly.  The first three times, it's forgivable when the ninja master spins around, disarms and beats them into blue paste.  But after the tenth time, there needs to be a workshop on "how to not get disarmed by these roving bands of ninjas".
"Officer Hart, it seems you shot the Joker in both of his knee caps."
"Yes sir, I did."
"Why? You had him at gun point, you should have cuffed him!"
"Sir, he's killed more people than Polpot at that distance.  He's also a lot easier to capture now that he needs two canes."
"But... but..."
"Who's going to be angry with me?  I intentionally wounded a mass murdering domestic terrorist with a history of killing police who have him at gunpoint..."

Or this:
Joker: "You caught me copper! I surrender..."
Cop: *bang, bang, bang, bang, bang*
Joker: *is dead*
Cop 2: "Why? He surrendered?"
Cop 1: "He always says that, then he kills someone, or blows something up."
Cop 2: "But how will we stop his bombs?!"
Cop 1: "We don't, we never stop them, Batman will do it."
Cop 2: "You can't know that for sur-"
Batman: "I stopped the bombs, too bad Joker got a...way... oh."

Seriously, if any of that happened... I'd be ok with it.