Talk: Gender and sexuality

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It occurred to me that there is no page on "homosexuality" or similar. My intention is for "homosexuality" and other stuff to redirect here.

I did a similar, much longer writeup, over on the TV wiki.

My intention was not to repeat it here; just to do a brief gloss and post it up to "get the ball rolling".

I won't be updating this. Please change it as you will.--The Dragon Demands (talk) 03:21, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Could you perhaps add sources and references for the text you have placed thus far? :) --Rhaenys Targaryen (talk) 08:45, 2 December 2016 (UTC)


Which parts need citations or are "interpretive"? Need to know what to fix.--The Dragon Demands (talk) 21:12, 3 April 2017 (UTC)

The sections "Characters who have engaged in homosexual behaviors" and "Societal Patterns of Gender and Sexuality by Region and Religion" are very much so devoid of citations and references. Further, references that have recently been added (references 13, 14, 16, 20, 21, 22) are not consistent with the use of references on this wiki (or the remainder of this page). For example, it should be {{Ref|twoiaf| Ancient History: The Dawn Age}}, not {{Ref|twoiaf|The Dawn Age}}. (the space prior to the chapter name is important too, due to a small issue with the reference template).
Further, the two sections previously mentioned could also do with some rewriting. For example the section under "faith of the seven":
The Faith of the Seven has a celibate clergy, which possesses a gender-blind priesthood of both men and women.
The Faith believes that the Seven gave men and women their sexual parts purely for the begetting of children.[7] This may imply that they view all non-procreative sex as immoral, and therefore do not consider "homosexuals" to be a distinct category of persons. At the least, there is no cited instance of them ever speaking in such terms.
Possibly due to having female clergy, the Faith of the Seven does conceptually recognize female homosexual behavior,[citation needed] and frowns on it similar to how it views male homosexual behavior.[citation needed] Perhaps also due to having female priests, there is no evidence that their society has a Top/Bottom binary like the actual Middle Ages.
At least in recent centuries, first cousin marriage is not considered incest by the Faith[citation needed] and is in fact relatively common among the nobility of Westeros.[N 1] House Lannister, House Tyrell, and even House Stark (which follows the Old Gods) have all had first cousin marriages in the past generation or two. In contrast, in the real Middle Ages incest was broadly defined as marriage between third cousins or closer[citation needed] (though the definition varied considerably over the centuries).[citation needed]
Actual attitudes towards sex outside of marriage or to homosexual behavior might not be uniform but vary from kingdom to kingdom or even family to family. Loras Tyrell's entire family knows that he is not attracted to women and in a sexual/romantic relationship with Renly Baratheon, but none of them cared; on the other hand he still kept it private to avoid public criticism. The Reach, or at least the Tyrell lands, may have a winking tolerance for homosexuality, but it is unknown if such attitudes are shared in The Vale of Arryn, or even in Oldtown to the south (seat of the High Septon in Westeros for many centuries until it moved to King's Landing 300 years ago).
On an everyday level, of course, many members of society do engage in sexual behaviors criticized by the Faith, such as homosexual behavior (Renly Baratheon and Loras Tyrell) or heterosexuals who engage in adultery and prostitution (Robert Baratheon).
The Faith of the Seven was introduced to Westeros by the invading Andals:[citation needed] Andal inheritance law is based on male-preference primogeniture.[citation needed] Daughters only inherit after younger sons, though daughters usually inherit ahead of younger uncles.[citation needed] Even in this system, however, it is not uncommon or unheard of for women to inherit lands and political power in their own right.[N 2] If their husbands die in war, women are also frequently expected to rule as regents until their children come of age.[N 3]
  1. Using {{Notes}}, examples of such marriages, both recent ones and less recent ones, could be given; This would make the information more complete as you can mention the specific people involved, while making the next sentence unnecessary (because the info would be in the note).
  2. Cite examples?
  3. Cite examples?


The "citation needed" tags speak for themselves. The bolded parts are, in my opinion, interpretation. "possibly due to", "this may imply", "perhaps also", etc.. In addition, the paragraph on Loras Tyrell seems to be a mixture of interpretation and the TV Series, as far as I can tell. Martin has confirmed both the sexual preference of and the relationship between Renly and Loras,[1][2] but, while it is likely that at least some family members of Loras (Margaery, Olenna) are aware of Loras's sexual preferences, the exact knowledge his family has on this is not confirmed. As such, the text should not read that his family was aware but simply didn't care, nor that this might mean that the entire Reach might be more accepting of such.
The cursive parts are, imo, also in need of a rewrite. Instead of "At least in recent centuries, first cousin marriage is not considered incest by the Faith", it might be better to write "The Faith does not consider first cousin marriage to be incest", as we have no indication (as far as I can recall at the moment) that this was not the case at any point in the Faith's history. Instead of "On an everyday level, of course, many members of society do engage in sexual behaviors criticized by the Faith, such as homosexual behavior (Renly Baratheon and Loras Tyrell) or heterosexuals who engage in adultery and prostitution (Robert Baratheon)." perhaps "Regardless of the opinions of the Faith, members of the society do frequently engage in sexual behaviors the Faith criticizes, such as adultery, homosexual behavior, and prostitution." Perhaps cite some examples here as well. Importantly, not only heterosexuals can commit adultery and engage in prostitution, although the text now separates it. And instead of "If their husbands die in war, women are also frequently expected to rule as regents until their children come of age.", perhaps "Should their husbands die and their heirs be too young to rule, women are frequently able to rule as regents until the heir comes of age.". (The regent-situation does not only apply when the men die in war ;) ). Also, inheritance laws are not bound to the religion, but the ancestry (Andal/First Men vs. Rhoynar).
Additionally, some more links to other wiki-pages could be made. I've placed these in your original text here on the talk-page as an example. Also, some statements in the text are off-topic, imo. For example, under "Asshai", it says "Nothing is forbidden in Asshai, a dark city of sorcerers. There are no children in Asshai.". Also, statements like "The views of the Dothraki on homosexual behavior are totally unknown." (under the section "Dothraki"), as it seems a bit unnecessary to list all the things we do not know, imo. (Additionally in that section, "The Dothraki practice polygamy, with one male khal often taking multiple wives." -> Although the Dothraki can practice polygamy, to say that this is "often" is incorrect. We simply do not know. All we know is that, among the Dothraki, at least the Khal's are known to be allowed to practise polygamy, as we have two examples of this. Additionally, in accordance with the "ancient ways" (which some khalasars still practise), a Khal might share his Khaleesi with his bloodriders.
Furthermore, I would suggest altering the build-up of the page a bit. Under "Societal Patterns of Gender and Sexuality by Region and Religion" (heading 5), divide it in "Westeros" (heading 5.1) and "Essos" (heading 5.2). Under these, the other categories "Faith of the Seven", "Slaver's Bay" etc. can be listed. An idea would be to set a NOTOC, as to keep the contents box at the top of the page from displaying more than two heading levels (as the contents box is rather long). Additionally, for Westeros, the naming could be a bit more consistent. "The Faith of the Seven" is mentioned, and then the "Old Gods of the Forest" (which should simply be "The old gods"), but instead of speaking about "The Drowned God", we get "Ironborn" next (referring to people instead of a religion), followed by Dorne, (who follow the Faith of the Seven) -- by speaking of a region instead of a religion or people. So perhaps it is an idea to name the sections after the regions? As the Faith holds in most of Westeros, we could get "Southren- and mid-Westeros" (heading 5.1.1), with "Dorne" as heading 5.1.2. Next "northern Westeros" (the old gods), and "The Iron Islands" (Ironborn).


I hope my comments aren't too disheartening and that I don't sound too critical. Clearly a lot of work has gone into this article, and it has the potential to be very good. But sourcing, interlinking, and attention to detail are an important foundation of a page, and it would be a shame if the page wasn't able to live up to its full potential because of issues with those foundations. Please let me know what you think. --Rhaenys Targaryen (talk) 09:36, 4 April 2017 (UTC)


Disheartening? No of course not. I strive for accuracy. All of these are excellent points. I was just trying to get the ball rolling.

Again it's based on a longer writeup I did for the TV wiki...


Oh don't get me started on the TV show Reach crap, I wrote a whole thing against that on TV wiki - if they were "tolerant" of it like Dorne, Loras wouldn't be publicly hiding it. But yeah...just because the Tyrells in the current generation don't accost Loras for this doesn't really give much proof of anything.

Children in Asshai and "nothing is forbidden" are the only evidence we have of social behaviors. --The Dragon Demands (talk) 20:14, 4 April 2017 (UTC)

Although it concerns social behaviors, it says nothing about gender or sexuality as far as I can see (especially the "there are no children in Asshai"), which is what the article is about :) --Rhaenys Targaryen (talk) 20:47, 4 April 2017 (UTC)