How About We Have a Little More "Equal" in our Everyday Lives?

August 06, 2015 / Alanah Winters

It’s no secret that women are still fighting for their equal half of everything in the world. Unfortunately, we as females still can’t even depend on equal pay for equal work. That’s just crazy in any era; especially our current day and age. Okay, no one panic, I’m not going to show a woman burning her bra or anything. It’s just I see the slant of the sexes in almost everything, because it exists everywhere.

Of course the slope of my writing has the degree I deem suitable, and that’s fun. I mean, a world where I can make everything to my absolute liking, who wouldn’t enjoy that? However even in my venture of writing, the unequal status between the sexes is notable. I’m not talking about the stories themselves, I understand these issues are present and addressed in the stories writers weave. Actually, my thoughts are more focused on my current experience with my interactive story I’ve been working on.

Now before I continue, I would like to say that the program I’ve been using to make my interactive story is really good and I’m very happy to have another avenue to tell the stories that sometimes crowd my mind. I’ve became more computer savvy than ever because of it, so I am thankful for that.

But (There’s always a “but”, isn’t there?), it was playfully brought to my attention that the animated characters were "flawed", if you will. The issue lies in difference between the female and male clothing functions. My husband and I noticed that the females had way more clothing options than their male counterparts. It’s pretty bad, to the point that I couldn’t find a suitable suit for my character’s business meeting. I was forced to make Ethan’s very posh business firm take a causal Friday policy.

My husband's and my conversation went something like this:

Husband: Why is Ethan in a pair of jeans in a meeting at his firm?

Me: That’s the best I can come up with. This…*I show him my options* is what I’m working with.

Husband: This is really minimal, even for minimalist standards. Now I’m mildly concerned. *Jokingly* I feel males are being marginalized in this game and will have none of it.

I laughed and continued with the coding of my story. However with every new outfit, I couldn’t help but to refer back to my husband’s joke. But my view was a little different than his. Why is it okay for the women to have every kind of outfit there is, but the men can’t even have one proper suit? Could it be that the males were meant to wear a tux to work?

Ken: Why can't I have my own less pink hair dyer and towel, I'm just saying.

Or could it be that even in this sector of entertainment, women are pigeonholed into caring more about what they wear and what shoes and accessories go with it than anything else? I understand I’m the pen to my stories, so I can make them be as I want them. But if my female characters have a full range of (mostly sexy) clothing while their male counterparts don’t, that makes for very weird scenes indeed. Of course I use this as a chance to build on my creative prowess to find a way around it, but why is it necessary in the first place?

Now, don’t get me wrong, I love all the options the female characters have in clothes. However, they could give the males just as many options as they give the females. As I see it, everything should be as equal as possible, even in cartooned fashion. That way, the built-in division of the sexes can be turned into the built-in symmetry of the sexes we need. I know adding more clothing is a very small fix to a huge global issue, but every fix counts and the easiest lessons learned are the ones people aren’t even aware they’re learning in the first place. Happy Thursday everyone, men and women alike!