Discusson: Social Stigma!

Social Stigma: Nudity, Full and Partial.
A World of Warcraft edition.

So, when over in Gnash's add for bare chested Blademasters I got into a need to discuss. Since discussion is healthy and this is one that could be interesting.
Far more interesting than just writing an essay on the subject for others to criticize at least.

So, nudity among the different races in Warcraft.

First we have to look at the different degree's of ”Civilization” as we see it. Since some warcraftian societies are closer to tribal than not.

More civilized nations/races:
Humans (lumping Worgen in here since culturally there wasn't that big a difference between Gilneas and the rest)
Dwarves
Gnomes
Blood Elves(High Elves)
(Panderen?)
Forsaken
Night Elves
Goblins
Draenei

More tribal
Orcs
Trolls
Tauren

This is a far to dimentional list since they are on different levels, but it is sort of correct.
First if we take a look at “less developed” cultures in our world, we'll see that most of them don't see female breasts as something unnatural. They don't see them as sexual objects and if it's not because the weather calls for more clothing they don't see a need to cover them up.
So in essence, the more civilization you get the more “Boobs” become sexual objects and not just any other part of a woman. In some places today even a bare male chest is considered to be indecent. Oh the horror of human skin.

So, I hope to find out which cultures would care about it more than others.

If think we quite easily can say that Trolls and Orcs wouldn't care one whit if a female was bare chested or not. Both are very much true tribal societies and I can't see they'd really look twice. The tauren always seem to have a bit more dignity, so I can see it being more rare there but I don't think it'd raise that big an eyebrow.

Humans (Worgen and Forsaken), Dwarves, and I can see having it as a social norm about female partial nudity, having them cover up. While not that as men. More if you live in a city maybe but not that much. On a warm day no one will still raise an eyebrow if a man takes of his shirt when doing sweaty work.

Goblins I think wouldn't lose clothes unless they got more money to do so. Same as they wouldn't put more clothes on for the same reason.

Draenei for a norm would go dressed. Yet I see the society they have as being so advanced that no one would care if either gender would walk around naked, whereas a human woman who walks around bare chested I doubt will get a good rumour.

High Elves I see having clothes be the norm for both genders. Not seeing bare chested work being that acceptable, that's for “Those lesser humans” after all. They don't work hard, they use magic. You get what I'm trying to say.
So for them I'd say partial nudity would mean more than it would for humans, if not be as scandalous. But they'd see the covering up thing as something equal.

The wild horse among the civilized races I see as the Night Elf. They for a long time had a female powered society. As the “Amazon” it's quite highly based around I don't see any night elves would have any problems with people walking around bare chested. Maybe 15-30 year old “kids” would droll over it, but for the average elf they'd just assume that for some reason wearing a shirt was in the way.

So, do I seem right, or am I fully off the wagon here?

Muzjhath wrote:
The wild horse among the civilized races I see as the Night Elf. They for a long time had a female powered society. As the “Amazon” it's quite highly based around I don't see any night elves would have any problems with people walking around bare chested. Maybe 15-30 year old “kids” would droll over it, but for the average elf they'd just assume that for some reason wearing a shit was in the way.

Damn Gnomes... stealing letters always!

Muzjhath wrote:
High Elves I see having clothes be the norm for both genders. Not seeing bare chested work being that acceptable, that's for “Those lesser humans” after all. They don't work hard, they use magic. You get what I'm trying to say.
So for them I'd say partial nudity would mean more than it would for humans, if not be as scandalous. But they'd see the covering up thing as something equal.

As little as us honest working Blood Elves like it, there is a fair share of "high class" NPC's that go the "if you got it, flaunt it" road. I'm thinking about the Jewelcrafters.

They flaunt it yes. But it's still covered up.
It's the difference between where they put magazines with women in bikini's and women who are naked with no cover I'd say.

You made me think. Why would women's bare chest be more indecent then men's? You mentioned it like that even in your examples related to WoW. In our world i think it can be explained of the women's standing in sociaty in the past. But in WoW, amongts the more civilized races (as you put it) man and woman have been equal from the begining.. as far as i'm aware. (Let's not count night elves' special case.) Therefore i imagine that in WoW a bare chest of a female or male has the same weight in the decent-indecent scale.

Then again i can be totally wronge, but i think the world we live in would had a similar past as WoW's, we might as well look at male and famle chest the same way.

About your question; I agree that probably the more civilized races concider less natural/decent to walk around with not much cloth on.
Exceptions are night elves. I read it back then on the offical RP forum that nigth elves prefer their cloths and armor to cover less, so they could be closer to nature; to feel the breeze stroking their skin, the touch of the grass under their feet, etc. This sounds quite reasonable for me.

Night elves are fine with prancing around half-naked and tbh they are not very civilized!

And men and women were not always equal in the Warcraft world ... not in troll society anyways I think?

But ya I think you hit the nail on the head with this one Muzhji anyways off to do some work now zzz

I heard that not in troll sociaty, that's why i wrote "the more civilized races", according to Muzjhath.

I agree to what you've said here.

Some of the races, Nelves, or just Elves, really. As an example.

They're considered to be "beyond mortal beauty" if to sound extreme, they'll want to show it off, big themselves up, be better 'cause they know they're perfect.

But that doesn't mean to be entirely naked, or bare-chested, but perhaps their armours or clothes are like that of Sylvanas, Alex~~ and Ysera etc.

That's not naked and doesn't have to be slutty, it's them knowing they're fucking awesome and can do whatever the f*ck they want, 'cause they'd kick your teeth out if you implied anything.

Kinda..

But back to nudity, yes, I agreed, tho I find Draenei hard to place, they're very.. over the top civilized.. I think they don't actually care if they're naked, or not, but due to decency, and most likely their believes, they dress up.

You honour the Light with a nice robe, for example. And quite often, draenei NPCs rarely have cleavages. I think.... Don't play 'em much.

The problem with breasts, is that you can't let them run free due to practicality.

Imagine running without proper support... Any athletic Femme would cover up, just to keep them tucked away like the rascals they are. I mean, who do they think they are, smacking us in the face like that?

It's the same reason Parkour practitioners strap their clothes to themselves with tape, it's to keep loose articles close to the body and to make your movement as unimpeded as possible.

Who says they do it in war?

This is a matter of social enviorment, a city, a stroll on the street, or that muddy path of a road in Org.

That reminds me of the story of the Amazons and how they cut off one of their breasts so archery would be easier.

I don't mind showing off what you've got in some races.

I always thought orcs would show more skin, but they're generally wrapped up from head to toe when I see people RPing them.

xD My belf shows off her legs and is branded a slut. But she's an elf. She knows she can flaunt it. And it's not like she's dancing on tables and taking her clothes off. I'd think belves wouldn't have a problem with showing off some skin, they know they're fabulous.

Gnomes and Dwarves... I wouldn't imagine them to be into these shows. Some humans depending on their character would want to show off, others less so.

I always imagined trolls to be living in the jungle having naked dance parties. Don't ask why. 'Cause I don't know.

Morinth wrote:I always thought orcs would show more skin, but they're generally wrapped up from head to toe when I see people RPing them.

That's because their in-game skins and textures look so God-awful, they- OH GOD TAKE THE IMAGES OUT OF MY HEAD.

Bare chested orcs - awesome.
Bare chested druids - a must.

the rest can do whatever they want.

I like the female orc textures!

Muscled, as they should be. I'd hate flimsy orcs parading about. That's the blood elves job. ORCS IS TOUGH.

Morinth, did you ever see Muz out of armor? SHe was basicly in small flimsy leatherstrips and leather trousers then.

During the Varog Gor trails she went barechested in Northrend due to having to use her tabard to carry a big animal heart.

But yes. This isn't about the practicalities. This is about the social aspects of it. Practically any female warrior of any nature would most likely tie any flimsy bits up, but I doubt they do that a day at the market.

It's mostly the male orc legs that I'm concerned about. Chests are... so-so. The torso, legs and feet make me want to claw my eyes out. My poor eyes.

Pfff Koz is just being sour cause he's jealous of Krogon (who somehow managed to look like a sexy piece of orcbeef hunkiness... although why did he stop wearing a kilt? :[ )

Also, I remember Shae starting to show up to the CoDarnassus meetings like this

Spoiler:

I was trying to emulate the old WC3 models (probably went a bit overboard lol) but some of the guys were OK with it in-character while others were like "wtf look at that whore" so I think it really just comes down to the individual. You can't really have a racial "standard" because not everyone will agree or play by it. :s

Updated models in MoP hopefully. Then we can all skip around a bonfire naked, flowers in our hair, holding hands and praising Anethion!

Well Shae. The problem is that a lot of players take social conventions from real life into the game. Which is very hard not to do but something I find fun and part of the challange when roleplaying.
Putting those away.

Recent anthropological studies have shown that all humans are concerned on some level about nudity. As a rule, most of us are embarrased by nudity not in a intimimate situation. Some even suggest that it might be one of our hard-coded traits.

However... what we define as nudity does differ between cultures. In some we cover ourselves with lots and lots of cloth. In others all that's required is apparently a piece of string to bind up the penis with or whatnot. Most cultures on earth clothe themselves though. Those that don't tend to live in areas with few cloth fibers easily accesible and plenty of shade (as well as a decently high all-year-around temperature).

However, there has been temporary exceptions. For instance, in the late 1790:s Paris. Plenty of high class women supposedly attended many elegant parties topless or semi-topless. And public bathing was not an all that uncommon occurence during the middle ages (with contemporary paintings details men and women bathing together without a string on their bodies).

Going from reality to wow, how should we consider this then?
Well the first thing we should look at I think is the typical enviroment the people in question live in. If it's cold then wearing warm clothing is rather natural. Similarily, in warm weather, having exposed skin to the sun is actually a very bad idea.

Humanity comes from Stromgarde/Lordaeron, which doesn's strike me as particularly warm or shady. So in all likelyhood humanity is accustomed to clothing and even if Stormwind is both warm and shady, being fully clothed is probably culturally firmly supported.

Orcs seems to live in warm sunny plains and ridges primarily. Places like durotar, the barrens and nagrand. Warm weather and a glaring sun suggests to me that they should be wrapping their bodies in cloth to shield themselves. Couple this with a very practically inclined culture and I find it rather unlikely that they'd be the sort of people that wouldn't bat an eyelash at topless women.
Add into the factor that the horde has only recently become gender neutral which suggests that orcs might still consider seeing their women without clothes is the prerogative of husbands/partners (since it's a very private thing).

The trolls are interesting... they do got fur and particularly the jungle trolls live in warm shady enviroments. But they have had a very alpha-male like social hierarchy. I'm not really sure with them. They might be the sort of culture where this occurs and isn't a big deal, particularly among the jungle trolls (less so among the forest and ice trolls).

The tauren are probably the least likely to cover up. Mostly because they seem to need it the least. And indeed, until wow they were never depicted with more than loincloths (admittedly, neither were the orcs).

The gnomes and dwarves, are probably without question wearing lots of cloth. Having the coldest starting area and underground tend not to be very warm either.

The elves... I don't know really. Druids (and thus men) seem to wear very little, but that could be related to shapshifting. The quel'dorei seem to be much bigger on lots of clothes than the night elves, though that could be bragging wealth. The night elves are probably a lot more starved on cloth than the high elves. After all... there's very little evidence the elves grow anything. And especially not massive fields of linen. So the only source would be silk (difficult to collect without farms) and fur.
After all, despite having lived in an almost mono-gendered culture for well over a thousand years the sentinels still cover up all erogenous zones (if nothing else). Their traditional homelands in northen kalimdor doesn't look very warm either.
This suggest to me that both types of elves do care. The night elves just prioritise their limited amount of cloth.

Helmfrid wrote:Updated models in MoP hopefully. Then we can all skip around a bonfire naked, flowers in our hair, holding hands and praising Anethion! the Naaru!

Fixed