Although nobody’s yet told me what the issue is (nor should they have to; it’s not their job to be always battling ignorance and educating people) I’ve been told, second- and third-hand that my article about Deep Down contains cissexism and transphobia.

I’m quite distressed at this because that was far from my intention, but intent isn’t enough. I’m ignorant, and with all the good will in the world I may have made a dreadful mistake.

I’m reading back over my own words - written in haste and anger - and while I still stand by all the things producing MRA freak outs I’m looking at the phrase “slap some tits on” in reference to a character model and things like “men in skirts” thinking oh fuck, what, Brenna, what are you doing, reducing femininity/femaleness to these physical characteristics?

If it turns out that’s the problematic part, I apologise profusely. I have never ever thought of transwomen as “men with…” and I’m horrified at the thought that my stupid mental image of a developer lazily making a new character model could be in any way likened to a human being’s incredibly brave and strong journey to live as they truly are. If these phrases upset somebody I can’t take that back. But I can acknowledge the error I made, apologise for the hurt caused the hurt that I caused, remove the offensive elements, work to educate myself, and leave this post up.

I’m not on Twitter which makes things hard but after I’ve posted this I’m going to find a way of reaching out through various channels to see what edits I can make to the piece (and also to my own thinking) to ensure it is inclusive of transwomen and transmen, as well as other kinds of human being who might be affected.

I think the fact that I mention a third umbrella gender category (edit: in the article, I mean) for those who do not identify as male or female shows I’m sensitive to non-binary gender issues - although obviously that’s very far from the same thing as cissexism or transphobia, even if they often get lumped together. I mention this because I hope this helps the people I speak with see that despite my privileges I am already capable of absorbing the kinds of lessons I obviously need to learn. (I also hope my tone there did not come across as dismissive, because I didn’t include a third category as a joke. I meant it very seriously. I don’t want to represent the world as a gender binary, because every bit of representation counts.)

As I said, I’ll be proactively reaching out, but if you’re informed on these issues and would be willing to talk to me about this and help me, my email address is easily obtained - and many of my games media peers have it along with my phone and IM details. I’d love to hear from you because I don’t want to cause hurt, and I passionately believe.

Please don’t get in touch to tell me I did nothing wrong, though! I am pretty sure I did, if people whose work and social justice stances I admire found something problematic, and while I’m not very happy right now I don’t need my hand held because I’m sad I offended somebody. I need to make it right for all the people I have offended.

Edit: I was lucky enough to get a really helpful response from the first person I contacted, so I can get the edits done and write a proper apology to go with this one this afternoon. I feel much better now I know I can do the right thing about it, you know? Hooray for learning!