Questions regarding the representation of East Asian men in Malifaux

[ConcernedNewbie]

I'm a new player trying to read into the lore of Malifaux and figuring out what faction is most aligned with my interests. However, as I've gone through the various descriptions on the website, I have noticed a trend that seems to be very in line with the Hollywood-esque desexualization of Asian males (if unaware of this, google the term to find several other articles explaining the viewpoint). This is something that bothers me personally, and tends to be the type of thing I avoid supporting financially. I really enjoy the mechanics of the game, but I have found the lore to be upsetting due to this. To clarify my point:

There are two masters within the game who are males of East Asian descent:

• Shenlong - a monk who is leader of a team of other male monks.
• Yan Lo - an elderly man who is essentially just a ressurected spirit.

Both of these characters are within roles that are typically deemed asexual. Conversely, Asian females (if in a relationship) are exclusively involved with White characters, e.g.:

• Mei Feng's romantic subplot involving English Ivan
• Kirai Ankoku's "lost love" is Francis Kitchener.

Have I misunderstood or overlooked some part of the lore? Please clarify if so.

If you are irritated by this post or feel that I am doing this to trigger some sort form of internet outrage, please know this was not my intention. I am not suggesting you should not like the lore. This is purely a personal annoyance that I hope to clarify so I can better enjoy the game.

[fire5tone]

I find this to be an extremely odd viewpoint towards this, almost everyone within malifaux has been desexualized, it's just very rarely important, id argue Yan lo is not an example of that-- you don't become the ancestor of that many people by just sitting back

And with mei despite the few appearances of her and Ivan it's really hard to explain just how much of a subplot it actually is, practically non-existent if you aren't paying full attention especially compared to everything else she does

And kirai worked at a brothel who's main clientele is white guys (because it's in malifaux and the ratio of Asian to everything else there is very low cause it's not real world geography, the breach is in Santa Fe, not china or japan)  when she fell in love with one of her clients... Is them being with white guys just the issue? Because there's more that aren't than are like misaki

[fire5tone]

 For context to most being desexualized, to my (very tired) memory, there are only 6 masters where we have anything about love life

Kirai (Francis)

Justice (something with OG judge?)

Mei and Ivan

Maxine (Orville)

And maaaaybe youko, who runs the qi and gong

but the only ones actively elaborated on are Maxine and kirai  so it really is basically everyone, and I'm not sure there's more than a few none one-off characters either

[Butch]

I'd give them the benefit of the doubt. In my experience they're trying to be very inclusive. For example the Abyssinia faction in The Other Side has highly evolved technology, male and female masters are evenly distributed over the factions. So in my interpretation Wyrd makes an efford to include Asian culture into the game.

But we're all not perfect and we're still learning all the time. Wyrd is still a very small company - to my knowledge not more than 10 employees - so they sure will miss things they would not do if they'd be aware of it.

But I can clearly see that this must be very unsatisfying for someone who maybe reads as eastern asian or has more knowlage about how eastern asian peolple are marginalizied.

[ConcernedNewbie]

3 hours ago, fire5tone said:

And with mei despite the few appearances of her and Ivan it's really hard to explain just how much of a subplot it actually is, practically non-existent if you aren't paying full attention especially compared to everything else she does

And kirai worked at a brothel who's main clientele is white guys (because it's in malifaux and the ratio of Asian to everything else there is very low cause it's not real world geography, the breach is in Santa Fe, not china or japan)  when she fell in love with one of her clients... Is them being with white guys just the issue? Because there's more that aren't than are like misaki

Honestly, it now seems even worse than I originally interpreted. So you are saying that 2 out of 3/4 of ALL romantic relationships mentioned in the lore are White Male/Asian Female. If romantic subplots are so unimportant to the lore, why do these exist at all?

Moreover, two out of five Asian female masters are/were prostitutes, even though, as you mentioned, it is set in Santa Fe. Are any of the white female masters prostitutes within the lore?

Quote

I'd give them the benefit of the doubt. In my experience they're trying to be very inclusive. For example the Abyssinia faction in The Other Side has highly evolved technology, male and female masters are evenly distributed over the factions. So in my interpretation Wyrd makes an efford to include Asian culture into the game.

I get what your saying, but it just comes across as this fetishized view of Asian culture created by those with only third-hand exposure to it. It is the same tropes you see time and time again in Western media. Asian men are portrayed as desexualised Bruce Lee-esque martial arts masters or devious fu man chu types. Asian females are prostitutes/geishas or exotic femme fatales.

 

Please prove me wrong here

[Adran]

I would include Marcus ( also interracial), but I'm not sure about justice/judge if it was in the stories or just fan speculation. Tara is another one who is probably in a relationship ( I know at least one of the authors writes them that way, but I don't know if there is official confirmation in a story). 

I agree, most characters are desexualised. Personally I prefer it that way, but that might not be to everyone's taste. Yan lo may currently fit your concerns but he has been following his descendents so it's not always been the case. 

I don't recall the monks being only male, but it's something that wouldn't trigger any issues in me so I wouldn't have a reason to remember. 

Prostitution is not uncommon in the background, the whole of the redchaple crew is from it, and the ten thunders were a crime syndicate that run at least one brothel, so I would expect it to be  I can't remember if kirai had any links to tt, because her story was before there was a tt presence. In the game. Performer and darkened are also crews that likely have some form of prostitution involved, so as someone that wasn't aware of the issues, I don't see a hugely unbalanced situation based on any particular race. 

I don't personally have any issues with the representation, but others may have. Most of the malifaux lore is free to access on the podcast or chronicles so you can check out most of these things for free. If you do feel that after that you don't wish to support Wyrd, then that's certainly a reasonable stand point. 

Hopefully that helps. 

On the whole wyrd uses so many stereotypes in the game that I find it hard to view them as being harmful to any particular group. None of the characters are truly good. Even the best have flaws, and there are a few that are more repugnant than the Asian crime syndicate. 

[Cats Laughing]

8 hours ago, ConcernedNewbie said:

 

Shenlong - a monk who is leader of a team of other male monks.

Both of these characters are within roles that are typically deemed asexual.

Shenlong is a very buff shirtless man (at least his first version model is). He is a asexual as Henry Golding or Daniel Henney or Tony Leung.

I'd ask you to reconsider your perception of monks. Not all Buddhist sects prohibit marriage or sexual relations.

 

 

[NoisyAssassin]

1 hour ago, Cats Laughing said:

Shenlong is a very buff shirtless man (at least his first version model is). He is a asexual as Henry Golding or Daniel Henney or Tony Leung.

I'd ask you to reconsider your perception of monks. Not all Buddhist sects prohibit marriage or sexual relations.

This does actually play into the negative trope that OP is talking about. From https://the-take.com/watch/the-asexual-asian-man-end-the-undesirable-stereotype: 
"Finally, the Asexual Asian has also been repeatedly portrayed as a Martial Arts Star:

Trish: “Is it true what they say about Hong Kong?”

Kai: “What’s that?”

Trish: “You know, all you guys do Kung Fu.”

Kai: “Of course. State law.” - Romeo Must Die

This particular portrayal—and the popularity of the Kung Fu movie—began in large part with Chinese martial artist and actor Bruce Lee. Lee’s departure from the portrayal of the weak and submissive Asian man helped audiences see Asian men as strong and masculine, and gave a lot of Asian men confidence and pride in their heritage. Still, Lee’s popularity also helped perpetuate stereotypes about Asian men—for example, their innate knowledge of martial arts or other “Asian” forms of fighting—and he was rarely given love interests or romantic partners in his films. In Lee’s most famous film, Enter the Dragon, his co-competitors Roper and Williams both spend the night with prostitutes, while his character stays focused on the mission."

[StormLordXIII]

9 hours ago, ConcernedNewbie said:

 

I get what your saying, but it just comes across as this fetishized view of Asian culture created by those with only third-hand exposure to it. It is the same tropes you see time and time again in Western media. Asian men are portrayed as desexualised Bruce Lee-esque martial arts masters or devious fu man chu types. Asian females are prostitutes/geishas or exotic femme fatales.

 

Hi and welcome to the community!

I've been playing Malifaux since the first edition and you are not the first person to raise the question of representation in the Malifaux universe on this forum. These discussions are important and I'm sorry to hear that this was your initial reaction to the lore. This suggests perhaps how the game is pitched and marketed could do with an update. I validate your feelings and think they are important. However, I think you are missing some key context as a new player who hasn't yet read through all of the lore in the faction books (especially the Ten Thunders). There are a couple points that I think might be relevant to addressing the questions you asked. Check out the stories "From the Ashes" and "Three Riddles and a Traitor" especially from the M2E Shifting Loyalties and M3E Ten Thunders Faction Book in particular. You can find "From the Ashes" in audio recorded form via the Breachside Broadcast (episodes 83 and 84), but the faction book is still new-ish so you'll have to buy it; story hasn't been recorded yet. These pieces tell a pretty definitive story about the Ten Thunders and many of the characters you have identified.

First, much, although not all, of the fluff about the Ten Thunders is written by a third-culture Asian-American author who grew up in East Asia, studies International Relations, can read and write Chinese, and did actual fieldwork in Beijing, Taiwan, Japan, and Vietnam when drafting his stories. He is an academic researcher but writes sci-fi as a hobby. The main issue he has tried to tackle is cultural stereotypes that result from the blending of Chinese and Japanese cultures. His mission has been to turn the Thunders into a vehicle for addressing migration, organized crime, and colonial and anticolonial movements in Malifaux's alternate timeline because those are historical issues that he studies and thinks are interesting. Wyrd has been extremely supportive of his efforts (he has worked with them for almost a decade) and if you read between the lines in all of his stories he breaks the fourth wall occasionally and makes fun of stereotyping. He did an interview with Third Floor Wars where he outlines all of this. Admittedly he has never written explicitly about the sexuality of Wyrd's characters for the Thunders but I imagine that's because relationships really don't take foreground in the stories - for any character, of any gender or heritage - as said. 

Second, about Mei and Ivan: It's mentioned once in a paragraph summary of her in the rules section (each character or model has a bio) but NEVER in any of the stories about her, and I know for a fact that the Ten Thunders author actually disliked that plot point which is why he never referenced it in the main stories. That same author wrote the single big story for the latest expansion book, Malifaux Burns. Ivan appears but there is nothing about Mei in his section. I suspect this was deliberate.

Third, regarding some of the other characters. I too was not thrilled about Youko's art, but I thought her written representation in the story Three Riddles and a Traitor was pretty powerful. A central plotline of the piece is Youko's ability to understand cognitive shortcomings that are based on the Nobel-prize winning science of Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky (this was in the author interview, he was inspired by the book "Thinking Fast and Slow). She's basically smarter than pretty much anyone else in the faction, and her ability to understand how people process information, rather than her sexuality (which isn't really discussed), is her defining trait.

Anyway, for the record, I think we should be able to discuss these issues respectfully regardless of our own backgrounds, but for what it's worth I am an East Asian male, and I play Malifaux and play the Ten Thunders as my faction precisely because they made me feel represented. You asked in your original post for someone to "prove you wrong." I don't think that should be the goal, but rather it's to move the discussion forward. Structural issues, especially concerning representation of culture, heritage, and identity are important. If the nuance of these characters doesn't come out from their initial descriptions to any new player checking out the website, that is food for thought. But I think the charge that the designers at Wyrd are unaware of these issues may be too severe. Thanks for starting the discussion, and for reading this. I hope that after you read more about the Thunders, they may become your favorite faction too! 

[NoisyAssassin]

Unfortunately, while Wyrd does have some good representation, they also have a lot of pretty big misses in terms of leaning into tropes and stereotypes. This wasn't one I was aware of, but now that it's pointed out and I've done a bit of reading it seems that they've definitely fallen into it. The related trope about Asian women is absolutely a problem in the game as it stands.

Of the 54 masters in the game, these are the ones I'm aware of having any sort of sexual or romantic relationships or actions mentioned:

- Kirai (as mentioned, an Asian woman who used to be a prostitute, and whose lost love is a wealthy white man)
- Mei (unspecified relationship with English Ivan, both sex and at least some level of romance implied)
- English Ivan (see Mei)
- Youko (runs the Qi and Gong, but don't think she's actually ever directly implied to have been a prostitute herself)
- Marcus (Black man, Myranda, a white woman, is his "mate")
- Maxine (white woman married to a white man, their relationship is shown as both loving and supportive)
- Lucas McCabe (white man, his fiancee was killed as part of his tragic backstory)
- Levi (cannonical r@pist)
- Seamus (cannonical r@pist and pimp)
- Yan Lo (currently the resurrected spirit of an old man, but has lots of descendants)
- Basse (Black man, has a daughter, I think I remember his wife dying as part of his tragic backstroy, but not 100% on this one)
- Lady Justice (white woman, had a romantic relationship with her last Judge, who was killed during a 2e story)
- Hoffman (attempted some awkward flirting with Sonnia Criid, was shot down)
- Mah Tuckett (gremlin, has children)
- Ophelia (gremlin, has children)

You'll also note that none of these relationships are queer at all, which is another miss. And the Black characters have a single parent and a really uncomfortable "behaving like animals" relationship in terms of their representation.   

Update: found another few instances going through an old thread
- Molly pines romantically over a male clerk in one story
- Ramos kisses Alyce while dancing with her at the Hollow Marsh Gala (and Levi flips his lid about it)
- Colette is described as having flirted with both men and women in order to manipulate them
- Asami dreams of having a husband and children one day
- Lynch runs an establishment *literally called the Honeypot*

[ConcernedNewbie]

Thanks for your insightful dialogue on the matter. After reading everything here, I imagine the generation of lore is a complicated task, devised by multiple people each with an opinion on where a story should go, and ultimately dictated by more than just intentions to create a good tale (i.e. sculpts, characters, previously established lore). Furthermore, I imagine tropes are so ingrained in our psyches that they become easy for writers to fall back on when trying to create stories.

I just hope that Wyrd will lean away from tropes and into more nuanced and novel representations of various cultures and characters, if for no other reason that it makes for more creative stories and better writing.

Regardless, I feel that the discussion has alleviated some of my initial unease, if for no other reason than witnessing your measured responses.

[Yore Huckleberry]

I also think it's helpful to recognize that Wyrd seems to evolve on this, over time. A number of the female masters have less sexualized sculpts as the editions advance (2e Lady J > 3e Lady J), or as they gain Titles (Youko from slipped-kimono to fully dressed ninja).

I also think there are places where they seem to have always trod carefully -- e.g., First Nations peoples have minimal early representation, despite being a common component of "Wierd West" gaming, and Wyrd managed to include the sense of "dangerous peoples beyond the frontier" with (mostly white) Neverborn and then later the Bayou gremlins (which, if they are an offensive caricature, are of white subcultures). That is to say: the usual euro-centric view of First Nations peoples seems to have never been included, and Wyrd found a different way to include a genre-staple of border tension between cultures.

Similarly, the balance of female protagonists is much stronger here than anything else I can think of. Same with non-white protagonists -- acknowledging all the problematic baggage that can come from that, particularly if the lore is written by white creators.

It's worth naming that any kind of wargaming is going to glorify certain elements of machismo or culture stereotypes, and doing so in a game that has comedy elements (Fuhatsu's sculpt) makes for a really unusual set of needles to thread. I don't think they'll ever manage to take up the dance without stepping on anyone's toes.

ALL of that said, I think these conversations are helpful. They help Wyrd think through these things, and they give voice to shifting expectations in the fandom, which helps us create opportunities for growth and learning and representation in gaming.

Glad for your question, @ConcernedNewbie!

[santaclaws01]

There are also a few other past relationships mentioned/implied with some of the asian women in the game.

Youko, who we know nothing about who she had a child with.

It was implied(or at least I read it this way, might just be me), that Minako had some form of physical relationship with the old Oyabun. Not a master but still narratively important.

And Asami, whose Asian family was killed as part of her Tragic Backstory.

 

 

As an aside I think it's worth noting that Yan Lo started as a fairly direct reference to Lo Pan, who was decidedly not an asexual character.

[DefectiveDice]

Wow im really enjoying reading this topic, and thank you to everyone who shared their thoughts so far.

A few thoughts i wanted to add:

In my view, what Wyrd does when writing most of their characters is start with a well known trope, and then twist it to make it their own thing. In this way, they make unique and interesting characters, who still feel familiar enough that we recognize and understand certain aspects of the character. Much of fantasy writing is just a copy and paste of Tolkien or other popular works. Some people like that, some people don't. On the other hand, a writer could try to make everything brand new and different, but that might alienate a more casual reader/player who has to do more "work" to understand what is going on. By way of example, Seamus is a mad hatter, fairly well known trope. Wyrd took that trope and added a "bad things happen" twist to it, by making him a serial killer, whoremonger, necromancer who is trying to bring about the apocalypse. 

 Unfortunately, many well known tropes come with a lot of negative stereotypes. In some cases, Wyrd has done (in my opinion) a pretty good job of countering those stereotypes by making the characters more nuanced. A good example is Marcus. The feral black man, beast master, noble savage trope. Obviously not a good look. However, for Marcus they added the detail that he is a scientist and was a college professor. His stories are both about resisting imperialist expansion (see High Noone) but also about the pursuit of knowledge (See: Eat of be eaten).

The point here is not that a few positive characteristics make up for the writers playing into stereotypes. The problem with stereotypes is not that they are false, the problem is that they only show one potential element of that group. For example, the oversexualization of female characters is not an issue because no women want to every be sexualized, its a problem when that's the only defining characteristic of all of the women in a story. The solution is not to pretend that women don't have any sexuality, it is to make sure that you have enough female characters to show a wide diversity of female experiences. Going back to the Marcus example, some other prominent black men in the story are Basse- Dedicated father and Niel Henry- Hardworking craftsman. (Quick note, governor general Marlow is described as having brown skin, but they don't give him a specific race). I think it would be fair to say that this is not enough different characters for my point to be fully water tight, but I do think it shows that effort has been made in a meaningful way, and we should also consider that the total amount of lore that has been written for Malifaux would probably fit in 1 novel, maybe 2.

Now to address the specific point brought up in the topic. As a few people have pointed out, I think that sexuality is a topic that the lore does not cover very much., perhaps to its detriment. While we do see interracial couples, which I consider positive representation (though I would like to see a white male/black female couple since its less tropey), we definitely do not see any non-heterosexual characters, at least not explicitly. I think that is a missed opportunity. But I think I largely disagree with how a few people have been characterizing the Asian female characters here.

To start, let's talk about Mei Feng (Im actually working on a video about her right now). Ruthless, unruly, charismatic leader of working people. None of these things are typical Asian female stereotypes. As far as her relationship with Ivan goes, I think their situation is even less clear than what folks have been discussing. To catch folks up, Mei Feng fights the Govenor General, and Ivan shows up to take care of her after the battle (impliedly on order from Ramos to learn more about Meis allegiance to the Thunders). They spend time together while she is recovering, and grow "close". But in "Ten Thunders Vignettes" from Ripples of Fate, it explicitly states that this was not a romance. I think at most it could be read to imply they may have slept together, but even that is unclear (Again, Wyrd seems to avoid romance/sex in the stories).

Now, this may not be enough to alleviate concerns about the Asian women all going work non-asian men, and the implication that Asian men are unappealing. For the record, I am not sure I disagree with OP's main point, just interested in furthering the discussion. But I do want to look at the other example of Asian female representation. Misaki is largely non-sexualized and is portrayed as a cunning leader with a conflicted morality (parents were likely both Japanese, though we never meet her mother). While Youko is sexualized, she is empowered by her sexuality and uses it to broker information (she's also the only person discussed so far who isn't a criminal). Yamaziko plays the traditional male role as the wise mentor. And as stated above, Asami is an aspiring mother who is manipulated into doing bad things. Overall I think there are enough different Asian women in the lore to give a fair amount of different perspectives without falling too far into stereotypes. That said, it would be nice to see more relationships between Asian women and Asian men.

All that said, lets apply this to the Asian man stereotype. I think the original post brings up the important point that there are not many examples of Asian men to look at. Nearly all of them are the stoic martial arts master type (Shenlong, Sensei Yu, Ototo, to some extent Kang) and don't have much characterization at all. I did a whole video on Shenlong, and for how important he should be to the overall story (he has a Tyrant living in his head) there is basically one story that gives us any real insight into his character. And that insight is almost entirely his thoughts about the Dragon, and them arguing with each other, but very little of him interacting with other characters. I think the point has been made that Shenlong is one of the least dressed characters in the game, and his rippling muscles are sexualized in the way that many female characters are sexualized, but I think this is missing the point of the post. Shenlong has no sexual agency. He does not interact with any female characters, nor is he described as having a family or girlfriend/wife, nor a desire to do so. What this implicitly says, is that while he may be physically attractive, he has no desire to be sexual, nor does any woman in the story have a desire for him. I might be willing to chalk that up to a lack of romance/sex in the story at large, but I think the problem is exacerbated by the lack of interesting and nuanced Asian males in the story in general. 

In conclusion, I think I largely agree that this is an area that Wyrd could do better in, with the caveat that they do not get too into the subject of sexuality in general, and perhaps do not want to. On the other hand, I would go further than OP and say that I think the representation of Asian Males in general needs to be fleshed out, as the few examples we have right now are very samey underdeveloped. I do want to add that one of the main things that drew me to this game is the great job Wyrd does with representation in general compared to almost anything else, and the fact that we can even have this discussion is a great thing. However, they are not perfect and I think it is fair to levy criticism where it is due. I am confident that they will not only read this thread, but seriously consider the concerns that have been raised. 

Two last things:

It is confirmed that Levi and Alyce are in a relationship, im not sure what one of the other posters meant about him being a r@pist (I know Alyce is young, but I dont think shes underage)

Not only do they not play into the hypersexual Latina stereotype with Perdita, but when Hoffman accidentally thinks she is hitting on him, she laughs at him. Just a fun thing to note.

[Cats Laughing]

Honestly I think that's a great post and only have a few hopefully additive comments:

- Wyrd has pushed forward more female representation in the game. There are various good reasons for this which don't need to be hashed out here (so as not to distract from the topic) but it does mean that there are fewer slots for named Asian men in the game*, which means that more work on those few characters would be needed to break past the tropes/stereotypes as you note is done with the Women and Black men in the game.

*There's unlimited space in the stories, but if you're not a game character the stories tend to result in bad things for you.

- It would be better for this as well if there were more Asian men outside of Ten Thunders. There's Sandeep, but there could be more.  The Other Side Kimon/Three Kingdoms releases could see potential Malifaux crossover which could allow for more of this.  Those factions do feel more likely to result in more Ten Thunders models, but the Guild & Court of Two connections could lead to Resser/Guild crossovers or maybe a sneaky Arcanist/Outcast/Explorer entry. Unnamed minions are most likely, but there could be an enforcer/henchman in there.

[DefectiveDice]

Great points. To your point, I was going to mention that a lot of these problems could be a result of spreading too thin. It is hard to represent any one group really well when you're trying to represent all groups. 

And I'm really glad you brought up the other side. The Boxer has a lot of potential to become a really interesting character. He is Mei Fengs brother who started the rebellion against the Guild in China. We only really see him in one story, and he doesn't get into any romance, but he is characterized as very charismatic and likeable. I could easily see him turning out to be a ladies man. 

[Spitfire]

15 hours ago, Cats Laughing said:

[...]

*There's unlimited space in the stories, but if you're not a game character the stories tend to result in bad things for you.

[...]

I would like to contest this one point but i agree with all the rest.
But there is *theoretically* unlimited space in stories, but stories have to be written, proofed, set etc. which is costing a lot of time and efford and in the end money.

If your main selling point is stories like say novel publishers that is all fine and well. For a miniatures wargame this is a nice to have which fluffs up the system but not directly connected to revenue (though undoubtedly a point of attraction to quite some people - me included). Which means there are financial aspects to be considered which effectively limits the space in the stories because of the need to find the balance between necessary to invite new players and not alienate existing players who're here for the sotires also but also not being wasteful because it can come to a point of just sinking money which a company needs to be able to exist (the money not the wastefulness ).