Sex(uality), sodomy and sin

[Xain]

Hello,

The debate on atheism on the DD7 thread made me think of this thread. Sexuality has a lot in common with atheism, insofar as both concepts are modern constructs. There were no homosexuals during CK timespan, no more than there were atheists.
Which of course did not prevent Count Mark to think that all the talk about god was rubbish, or to prefer James to Jane, and to seek confort in James' arms (and buttocks) even as Countess Jane was going to give birth to its legitimate heir. He would do so rather freely - that is, unless someone snitches him to an overzealous priest which will mark him as a heathen and a sodomite.

However interesting, though, the anachronism of concepts such as atheism and homosexuality, in my opinion, does only highlight the difficulty to have a game that is entirely historically accurate - and that it doesn't really matter. A reconstruction of medieval sexuality will imply a couple of PhD-worthy researches, to come up with a system that would be mostly dull.

Which takes me to the second, and most important, part of my post: gameplay.

Let's then accept, for the sake of gameplay, that sexuality is a thing, and that characters "have" different sexualities (whatever the system will be: homo-bi-hetero, Kinsley scale or whatnot).

Yet, the fact of "having" a sexuality alone should not influence much except for the stress. A "homosexual" character can well decide to live a chaste life, or reluctantly do its duty to the House, without ever "practising". A sad an stressful life, for sure. But who would even know?

It would be great if CK3 separated sexuality as a preference from sexuality as practice. The former would only be a personality trait (heavily) influencing stress and triggering events, while the latter would be a matter of religion/culture (hence a sin or a virtue if the religion say so) and, when relevant, will represent a secret and influence opinion.

On a final note, it would be cool if male and female sexual practice could be separated, so that a given religion could, for example, consider sodomy a sin, but stay silent on what the Duchess does with her maids...

 

[Patriarch of Bub]

Mmm... As far as i understand isn't this pretty much how ck3 will work?

Sexuality won't be a trait, so unless slandered/caught and exposed people won't have a reason to think less of you.

We'll have to see how the stress will factor.

Also traits will influence wheter or not a character will seek out lovers, so even if homosexual i don't think every character will act on it.

I agree with you, but i think we'll mostly have to wait and see.

 

[Xain]

Mmm... As far as i understand isn't this pretty much how ck3 will work?

Sexuality won't be a trait, so unless slandered/caught and exposed people won't have a reason to think less of you.

.

That's what I understood as well, but it's reassuring someone else came to the same conclusion!

We'll have to see how the stress will factor.

Yes... although I easily see how the stress factor will play out in that case. I hope there'll be a good balance of AI characters acting on it, and AI characters resisting to the sins of the flesh (well, when their religion considers them sinful, that is!)

 

[Max the great]

Hello,

The debate on atheism on the DD7 thread made me think of this thread. Sexuality has a lot in common with atheism, insofar as both concepts are modern constructs. There were no homosexuals during CK timespan, no more than there were atheists.
Which of course did not prevent Count Mark to think that all the talk about god was rubbish, or to prefer James to Jane, and to seek confort in James' arms (and buttocks) even as Countess Jane was going to give birth to its legitimate heir. He would do so rather freely - that is, unless someone snitches him to an overzealous priest which will mark him as a heathen and a sodomite.

However interesting, though, the anachronism of concepts such as atheism and homosexuality, in my opinion, does only highlight the difficulty to have a game that is entirely historically accurate - and that it doesn't really matter. A reconstruction of medieval sexuality will imply a couple of PhD-worthy researches, to come up with a system that would be mostly dull.

Which takes me to the second, and most important, part of my post: gameplay.

Let's then accept, for the sake of gameplay, that sexuality is a thing, and that characters "have" different sexualities (whatever the system will be: homo-bi-hetero, Kinsley scale or whatnot).

Yet, the fact of "having" a sexuality alone should not influence much except for the stress. A "homosexual" character can well decide to live a chaste life, or reluctantly do its duty to the House, without ever "practising". A sad an stressful life, for sure. But who would even know?

It would be great if CK3 separated sexuality as a preference from sexuality as practice. The former would only be a personality trait (heavily) influencing stress and triggering events, while the latter would be a matter of religion/culture (hence a sin or a virtue if the religion say so) and, when relevant, will represent a secret and influence opinion.

On a final note, it would be cool if male and female sexual practice could be separated, so that a given religion could, for example, consider sodomy a sin, but stay silent on what the Duchess does with her maids...

I like your ideas and i think it would be great to have it in the game. I hope Paradox will not be politically correct and make something bad out of it like Deus Vult.

 

[Alfray Stryke]

Some of this was hinted in this article https://www.usgamer.net/articles/paradox-answers-12-major-questions-about-crusader-kings-3

Characters in Crusader Kings 3 can be heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, or asexual. The way other characters react to this will be based primarily on their religion.

 

[LukeCreed13]

what the Duchess does with her maids...

Mmm... The question at this point would be: would the average medieval man have the same, u-uhm, "dirty mind" when thinking about sapphic relationships? I mean, would your typical European middle-age noble even acknowledge the possibility of sapphic relationships? And what about a Muslim or Indian noble? This is getting complicated, but interesting at the same time...

 

[Xain]

I like your ideas and i think it would be great to have it in the game. I hope Paradox will not be politically correct and make something bad out of it like Deus Vult.

What has politically coreectedness to do with that? I did not see my proposal as specially controversial, really.

The "invention of sexuality" is a pretty widespread academic position (Foucault, Ariès...), and it certainly does not mean that tdifferent sexualities are "unnatural" (pretty much the opposite, its an argument for tolerance and pluralism).

On the subject of the post, I can totally foresee events for teenage homosexual characters of the kind:

"I have seen John again today. Despite my efforts I could not avoid staring on his strong, strong body...

• Pape Satan ! I'll run to the Chapel! (50% gains the trait "Zealot" + medium increase in stress)
• I appreciate the image of God in him. I should dwell more in bible studies (50% gains the trait "Chaste" + 10% gains the trait Zealot + minor increase in stress) ;
• I won't cast shame on my House! I'll go to the brothel and find myself a wench instead (25% gains the trait "bisexual" and loses "homosexual" + major increase in stress)
• Get closer, Sir John... (launches chain of events that can result in John gaining a secret on us, becoming a rival with a substantial increase in stress, or becoming our lover with a substantial loss of stress)

 

[cosmeIII]

Hello,

The debate on atheism on the DD7 thread made me think of this thread. Sexuality has a lot in common with atheism, insofar as both concepts are modern constructs. There were no homosexuals during CK timespan, no more than there were atheists.
Which of course did not prevent Count Mark to think that all the talk about god was rubbish, or to prefer James to Jane, and to seek confort in James' arms (and buttocks) even as Countess Jane was going to give birth to its legitimate heir. He would do so rather freely - that is, unless someone snitches him to an overzealous priest which will mark him as a heathen and a sodomite.

However interesting, though, the anachronism of concepts such as atheism and homosexuality, in my opinion, does only highlight the difficulty to have a game that is entirely historically accurate - and that it doesn't really matter. A reconstruction of medieval sexuality will imply a couple of PhD-worthy researches, to come up with a system that would be mostly dull.

Which takes me to the second, and most important, part of my post: gameplay.

Let's then accept, for the sake of gameplay, that sexuality is a thing, and that characters "have" different sexualities (whatever the system will be: homo-bi-hetero, Kinsley scale or whatnot).

Yet, the fact of "having" a sexuality alone should not influence much except for the stress. A "homosexual" character can well decide to live a chaste life, or reluctantly do its duty to the House, without ever "practising". A sad an stressful life, for sure. But who would even know?

It would be great if CK3 separated sexuality as a preference from sexuality as practice. The former would only be a personality trait (heavily) influencing stress and triggering events, while the latter would be a matter of religion/culture (hence a sin or a virtue if the religion say so) and, when relevant, will represent a secret and influence opinion.

On a final note, it would be cool if male and female sexual practice could be separated, so that a given religion could, for example, consider sodomy a sin, but stay silent on what the Duchess does with her maids...

From a logical perspective of the explained secrets system, we'd consider that sexually active (lustful trait, has lover of the same sex) homosexual characters who live under a religion that frowns upon such preferences now have the fact as a 'secret' which they must hide, while sexually inactive (chaste trait, no lovers) homosexual characters would not have this secret, or would at least have a much easier time hiding it from prying eyes. Hopefully Paradox has already thought of this, or will think on it in the future.

The separation of 'practical' and 'preference' should already be distinguished by the secrets system on its own, without the need to split it into two elements within gameplay perspective. The exposed secret would have one or another impact on relations depending on the viewing character's religion.

Then again, it may be that keeping it all into the secrets system would prove too complicated to tackle the issue.

On your final note, I wholeheartedly agree. A woman's secret generated from being an active homosexual could be a different secret entirely from the man's, handling different opinion penalties.

 

[Max the great]

What has politically coreectedness to do with that? I did not see my proposal as specially controversial, really.

The "invention of sexuality" is a pretty widespread academic position (Foucault, Ariès...), and it certainly does not mean that tdifferent sexualities are "unnatural" (pretty much the opposite, its an argument for tolerance and pluralism).

On the subject of the post, I can totally foresee events for teenage homosexual characters of the kind:

"I have seen John again today. Despite my efforts I could not avoid staring on his strong, strong body...

• Pape Satan ! I'll run to the Chapel! (50% gains the trait "Zealot" + medium increase in stress)
• I appreciate the image of God in him. I should dwell more in bible studies (50% gains the trait "Chaste" + 10% gains the trait Zealot + minor increase in stress) ;
• I won't cast shame on my House! I'll go to the brothel and find myself a wench instead (25% gains the trait "bisexual" and loses "homosexual" + major increase in stress)
• Get closer, Sir John... (launches chain of events that can result in John gaining a secret on us, becoming a rival with a substantial increase in stress, or becoming our lover with a substantial loss of stress)

I meaned I hope they dont nake it bad or too fast, because its a politically good thing. I would like this in the game, but if they dont implement it good it would be bad.

 

[Henry IX]

Mmm... The question at this point would be: would the average medieval man have the same, u-uhm, "dirty mind" when thinking about sapphic relationships? I mean, would your typical European middle-age noble even acknowledge the possibility of sapphic relationships? And what about a Muslim or Indian noble? This is getting complicated, but interesting at the same time...

It is complex. Medieval authors did not view sexuality (particularly female sexuality) in the same way as modern writers do. In addition, when describing sex, medieval authors were generally fairly circumspect, so even when lesbian sex was being described it could be hard to decode what happens or even if sex is occurring (kissing, for example was a common activity to show affection, not necessarily sexual). However, descriptions by travellers of what occurred in the Turkish harems certainly seemed to be rather too, um... detailed for a strictly factual account. While I cannot prove that the author's intent is pornographic I would suggest that an element of titillation certainly appears to be included.

From a legal sense only penetrative sex was 'real sex' and women were not considered to have sex in this sense, and it was viewed as effectively masturbation and had relatively light punishments (by medieval standards). If one of the women used a 'devise', then she was seen as impersonating a man, and therefore committing sodomy (in medieval parlance a sex act that could not lead to conception). The punishment for this included things like burning at the stake.

Whilst this stuff is all interesting, I do not feel the need for it to be included in the game, although a slightly different set of events might be appropriate. The other fact of note is that during medieval times women did not have the power to refuse their husbands and so existing sexuality often could not be expressed exclusively. Once again, the fact that women could not have sex (without the use of an object) under medieval conceptions means that lesbianism could probably be practised alongside marriage, to the point that a standard practise was to have women sleep together to protect their 'purity' when unmarried or the husband was not present.

 

[Pannonius]

I like your ideas and i think it would be great to have it in the game. I hope Paradox will not be politically correct and make something bad out of it like Deus Vult.

Yeah, "Deus Vult" is pretty bad, but Paradox handled the matter admirably.

 

[2333Vladimir]

heathen and a sodomite.

I wonder if there could be a crusade against this man.

 

[Antediluvian Monster]

The debate on atheism on the DD7 thread made me think of this thread. Sexuality has a lot in common with atheism, insofar as both concepts are modern constructs. There were no homosexuals during CK timespan, no more than there were atheists.
Which of course did not prevent Count Mark to think that all the talk about god was rubbish, or to prefer James to Jane, and to seek confort in James' arms (and buttocks) even as Countess Jane was going to give birth to its legitimate heir. He would do so rather freely - that is, unless someone snitches him to an overzealous priest which will mark him as a heathen and a sodomite.

This is bit of a weird statement. You are saying that sexuality is a modern concept and that there were no homosexuals during CK timespan... and then go on and say right afterwards that there were homosexuals during CK timespan. Homosexuality is not just the modern homosexual identity (which is indeed a social construct, just like every other social identity) it also includes the underlying homosexual sexual preference which you describe Count Mark as having. He could be accurately described as being "homosexual" regardless of his lack of modern homosexual identity.

 

[Nuklearius]

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