Non-Binary Kerbals and Gender Non-conforming Kerbals In KSP2?

[Aliquido]

I'm not against choosing your gender identity, but like, they're pieces of space broccoli.

[Curveball Anders]

18 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

These are Kerbal castes, like the bees and ants have (queen, worker, drone, soldier, lawyer, etc.)

Male Queens?
That's way to woke. 
What's next? Brit's singing God save the King? 
Oh, they are ...

 

[Bej Kerman]

11 minutes ago, Curveball Anders said:

Male Queens?

"Female Queens?"

FTFY

[Bej Kerman]

12 minutes ago, Curveball Anders said:

That's way to woke. 

No it isn't.

[Bej Kerman]

14 minutes ago, Aliquido said:

I'm not against choosing your gender identity, but like, they're pieces of space broccoli.

And? The game already has female kerbals. The game already has male kerbals. If you're against the idea of NB kerbals, then it's probably not the "kerbal" in "NB kerbal" you don't like.

Edited October 26, 2022 by Bej Kerman

[magnemoe]

3 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

Moment of inertia. It differs.

An point, however all kerbals weight the same. On mission with very strict dry mass restriction an lighter kerbal would be better. 

Then cars are certified for fuel use they are as light as possible. Driver is an small and lightweight woman, you drain fluids as much as possible and reduce electricity use so no AC.

[KerikBalm]

51 minutes ago, BigStar Aerospace said:

That same argument was made when they tried adding the female kerbals.

Yea, and I am still not convinced that it was a better idea than making them androgenous or asexual.

As @Aliquido said, they might as well be space broccoli 

[kerbiloid]

36 minutes ago, Curveball Anders said:

Male Queens?

Either She-Kraken is Kerbal Queen, or their Queen is hidden below the Draft Office building.

12 minutes ago, magnemoe said:

An point, however all kerbals weight the same.

I meant, irl.  

12 minutes ago, magnemoe said:

Then cars are certified for fuel use they are as light as possible. Driver is an small and lightweight woman, you drain fluids as much as possible and reduce electricity use so no AC.

Not mass. Moment of inertia.

 

***

Spoiler

36 minutes ago, Curveball Anders said:

What's next? Brit's singing God save the King? 

Yes. In hindi.

Edited October 26, 2022 by kerbiloid

[saxappeal89129]

Quote

 It is our desire to make this an inviting forum for all members of our Kerbal Space Program community.

------------------------------------------

Quoting a Mod above... I would also like to suggest that religions be represented as well; or at least theology in some sort or fashion. 

I agree whole heartedly with equal representation for avatars, if that's how Kerbals are viewed. However, to leave out religions would be a direct violation of inclusivity. Maybe include yamakas, hijabs, or other religious attire.  Adding in sliders for body weight, size may also be beneficial, and maybe Kerbals with robotic arms/legs for prosthetics.

As the bumper sticker says "COEXIST".

Edited October 26, 2022 by saxappeal89129

[Bej Kerman]

2 minutes ago, saxappeal89129 said:

Quoting a Mod above... I would also like to suggest that religions be represented as well; or at least theology in some sort or fashion. 

Why?

[Gargamel]

8 minutes ago, saxappeal89129 said:

Quoting a Mod above... I would also like to suggest that religions be represented as well; or at least theology in some sort or fashion. 

I agree whole heartedly with equal representation for avatars, if that's how Kerbals are viewed. However, to leave out religions would be a direct violation of inclusivity.

There's a reason we don't allows religious discussion on the forums, it causes arguments.  It's in the rules as defined by Private Division.   As such, we won't be having religions in the game, or discussion of such on the forums.

 

[saxappeal89129]

5 minutes ago, Bej Kerman said:

Why?

To represent all of us... 2/3rds of the planet believes in a higher power of one form or another. Is it too much to think that "little green men" wouldn't be influenced by theology?

[Pthigrivi]

18 minutes ago, saxappeal89129 said:

Quoting a Mod above... I would also like to suggest that religions be represented as well; or at least theology in some sort or fashion. 

I agree whole heartedly with equal representation for avatars, if that's how Kerbals are viewed. However, to leave out religions would be a direct violation of inclusivity.

I think this misses the point. The idea is to create a set of visuals that is maximally inclusive in terms of a players ability to read the stories they wish into the game. To have one model of Kerbal with a square head and a widows peak reads as all kerbals are male, stated or not. Adding visually 'female' kerbals expands on that, as does adding kerbals with beards and kerbals with glasses and kerbals with different hairstyles. Those visual add-ons that create variety are non-specific. Lots of different kinds of people have different hair and glasses. To add specific religious iconography doesn't open up the different ways you can view kerbals but narrows it, because it's directly specifying to the player what human religion these creatures have. The same would be true if you gave them lederhosen or Native American headdress. It's too specific. This is what I meant when I offered that the game should not tell the player "your program is the "United States of Kermerica" because thats a restrictive identity rather than one that lends itself to multiple interpretations. Thats why folks have pointed out this isn't about adding labels or injecting canon. In most ways the fact that KSP keeps its canon purposefully vague is one of its key strengths, because it lends itself to so many different people and their personal interpretations. 

Edited October 26, 2022 by Pthigrivi

[Gargamel]

Since we apparently crossposted, I will reiterate. 

We will not be entertaining any religious arguments for or against here on the forums. 

[Curveball Anders]

1 hour ago, Bej Kerman said:

No it isn't.

That's a very selective quote ...

[Scarecrow71]

There is no way I can ask this question without it sounding bad, so I'm just going to ask it:  What difference does it make what gender the kerbals are?  It's a GAME, first and foremost; any gender identities you want to see or not see in the game are coming from you, not the developers.  Why does the game even have to include anything specific such as gender when the point is to send these little green people into space?  Gender plays ZERO role in the game, so why does this have to even be a topic?

[Vanamonde]

There are 3 topics which have been ruled off-limits for this forum: politics, religion, and Nazism. It has nothing to do with their importance or the pros and cons of the issues, and is SOLELY due to the fact that history has shown that people cannot remain polite while discussing them. For this reason, we have a zero-tolerance policy about the subject of religion. We understand why these rules can be frustrating but the alternative is to ban lots of people over the arguments that inevitably result, so these rules are not going to change. Discussion may now resume here but only so long as it remains polite and abides by forum rules. 

[Superluminal Gremlin]

Ok let's keep it polite people.

 

I am neither for nor against. It doesn't really change what KSP 2 is. I'm all for having analogues of famous space people (Ride, Valentina, so on so on), and people from the LGBTQI+ (I think that's it?) community, it would be a great addition and add some much-needed diversity to the stock 4 kerbonaughts.. But remember that this is just a space game. Sure, it would be cool to have some more new and famous people, but I'm not to fussed. Thats my opinion.

 

[Bej Kerman]

People are still saying "it's just a space game" like that ship didn't sail when Squad implemented genders in 1.0. If a Kerbal can generate with a tag that reads "Male" or "Female", then it is not a lot to ask - it isn't even anything to ask - for a tag that says "Chooses not to say" or something.

Edited October 26, 2022 by Bej Kerman

[t_v]

1 hour ago, Scarecrow71 said:

There is no way I can ask this question without it sounding bad, so I'm just going to ask it:  What difference does it make what gender the kerbals are?  It's a GAME, first and foremost; any gender identities you want to see or not see in the game are coming from you, not the developers.  Why does the game even have to include anything specific such as gender when the point is to send these little green people into space?  Gender plays ZERO role in the game, so why does this have to even be a topic?

The reason it is a topic is because right now, gender is part of the game, in the code and in the distribution of features in kerbal. There are clear parallels between kerbal and human sexes, and people want the game to not include specific genders. If you are in support of imagining kerbals to be any gender rather than the suggested ones, then it would be best to remove the distinctions and make that player-driven identification easier. Everyone wants to play their space game as a space game without gender getting in the way, so removing the two-gender system will make it one step closer to that space game experience. 

Edited October 26, 2022 by t_v

[MechBFP]

1 hour ago, Scarecrow71 said:

What difference does it make what gender the kerbals are? 

If you read the rest of the thread, that has already been answered, but to reiterate it is because people like being able to create characters in video games that are representatives of who they are, or perhaps who they want to be.

It's the same reason why people like character customizers in games, it is the reason why there are meme's about people spending a 100 hours in the character customizer before even starting the actual game.

 

Edited October 26, 2022 by MechBFP

[BigStar Aerospace]

4 hours ago, Aliquido said:

I'm not against choosing your gender identity, but like, they're pieces of space broccoli.

Be mindful deary; they're pieces of space broccoli with genders...

[snip]

1 hour ago, Superluminal Gremlin said:

LGBTQI+

(super close) LGBTQIA+ now, but don't worry, the Alphabet Mafia keeps growing so sometimes it's hard to keep track.

Edited October 27, 2022 by Vanamonde

[BigStar Aerospace]

ANYWAYS! Everyone, thank you for getting this threat to 6 pages, it means ALLOT to me that many of you are willing to defend the identities of others even if you have no personal way of relating. You are the types of people that will help our society move to better and happier places! SO AGAIN!!!!! THANK YOU!!!!!!!!

[Pthigrivi]

3 hours ago, Scarecrow71 said:

There is no way I can ask this question without it sounding bad, so I'm just going to ask it:  What difference does it make what gender the kerbals are?  It's a GAME, first and foremost; any gender identities you want to see or not see in the game are coming from you, not the developers.  Why does the game even have to include anything specific such as gender when the point is to send these little green people into space?  Gender plays ZERO role in the game, so why does this have to even be a topic?

This is a perfectly reasonable question to ask. I think you're actually right that in the broad sense the perception of gender should be given to players. In fact I think when you read the substance of the OP's post they're not actually asking for each kerbal to have its gender identity explicitly defined for the player. Even if they tried the result would inevitably be more reductive and proscriptive than what actual players personal imagination and interpretation allows. 

The reason its a topic here, (and I'll grant the mods have been incredibly patient with us), is that this is a complex social issue that has to do with the dialog between visual cues within the game and the perceptions they do or do not encourage.  In this way we're not talking about hard facts or explicit canon, but symbols. Symbols are tricky things. They're important, but they're subjective. They allow multiple interpretations, and the broader the symbolic vocabulary the more room viewers have to express their own imagination. So, for instance, when KSP first started there was just one model. This isn't because Squad specifically intended Kerbals to be identical clones, its because they started with a character named "Jebediah Kerman" and had lots of other things to do building the base game and didn't immediately have the time to make a bunch of new models. The symbol of a square head and a widow's peak and a string of male-sounding names implicitly signaled to players that all these little creatures were male. When they had time they augmentented that by adding a new model and new characters and names that encouraged the interpretation that there were at least both male and female kerbals so that more people could see themselves abstractly represented in the game. Now in KSP2 they've added a huge range of little personal symbols and even unique emotional personalities that greatly increases the range of interpretations players can create and apply as they're making stories. So gender is there, sort of, it's just symbolic, and diverse, and open to player interpretation which only makes kerbals seem more unique, human, and relatable. 

Edited October 27, 2022 by Pthigrivi

[saxappeal89129]

On 10/21/2022 at 5:27 PM, Pthigrivi said:

I think this is great, and you may be in luck! They've put quite a bit of work into creating a much more diversified set of styles and looks together that don't seem altogether necessarily bound to any specific gender norm. We've seen a number of looks both in early previews and animations that don't seem to require or lean to heavily on cis/normative binaries. To a large degree the looks of individual kerbals appear to be randomized, and I don't see any reason why male or female needs to be codified by the code itself. Hopefully Kerbals can be a kind of aspirational stand-in for all of us, that Kerbals are Kerbals just as People are People. 

The fact that gender fluidity and sexual orientation are being discussed in this forum is inappropriate (in my opinion), and if it is considered in the game then that's a decision that each person can make on their own; its a personal private choice just like in the "professional world". [snip]

Edited October 27, 2022 by Vanamonde