"...an intersex Jewish lesbian..."

I think you forgot to make her black as well, to cover all bases XD

But I'm happy with you that this piece will show up in a gallery! What kind of, if I may ask?

I was just thinking the story out (she started off as just a dude), and it came around case by case. After all, the more confusing I make her to Mencia (who is, after all, an obliviously sheltered noblewoman who probably believes menstruation is caused by sea serpents), the more sides of Mencia's character I get to explore.

If it's set in Mediaeval Catholic Spain in the wake of the reconquista, how can I establish that this character has been on the absolute shit end of society? Jewish.
How can I establish that she's blackmailed into staying with this asshole of a Don? Secret gender. Girl in drag is too obvious and too overdone, let's make her intersex.
Which also explains some of her own backstory AND why she's so masculine nobody questions her gender despite her task of coercing maidens into bed with this douche.
And how can I establish why she has internal conflict with sticking around? She (spoiler) has a crush on Mencia's twin sister, and constantly wonders to herself whether her motivation in this mission is really so base.
Black was too much, since this was Reconquista Spain and what with all the racial tension going around, it would have raised problems with the story structure. Her job was to pass unnoticed through brothels and taverns and coerce the aforementioned maidens. How do you make a character "never be noticed?" You make them white.

But we've had so many fucking people in books or movies where everyone's straight, cis and white for the sake of them being straight, cis and white. So I never really like people insulting "gay for the sake of being gay" or any of that, because we have an imbalance to correct X3

And it's a small student display gallery, they accepted some of my collages and watercolors. Ironically, he talked about how "some of the stuff people showed me were obviously assignments! And so bland!" And two of the pieces he selected, I actually made for high school art assignments X3 I'm just worried it'll all be mislabeled, since I forgot to write the info on the back of the pieces XP

I was of course kidding with the "making her black", and I could've also added "...AND put her in a wheelchair" to further that minority joke. And isn't it weird that women are often treated like a minority, when they, last time I checked, make up roughly half of the earth population? At least when it comes to faceted leading roles in media, they still kinda are. Let alone LGBT folk. Some imbalance to correct for sure

And congrats again for being chosen into that gallery! I guess only SFW stuff was on debate, would've been interesting otherwise And as if "assignment" automatically implies bad. Some people DO like to draw, even if they got assigned to do so. It's surely the case with you, I would say. I also like how complex your comic idea is. With me, it's usually simply "there are two guys, and they are going to fuck" XD Your approach is more artistic, and I look forward what you will come up with

There's nothing wrong with throwing in a wheelchair, except that in this day and age, she'd probably be dead by this age had she needed one of those.
They're called the 51% minority for that exact reason (mostly because they live longer - half of that is biology and half of that is manly men leading more dangerous lives out of a sense of machismo, which is more significant than even you'd think).
I'm still trying to find the source for this stat, but after pitching ideas to people in media for some time, and from what I've observed myself, we have appalling male bias with most of our things. The stat was that when a group is 16% women (insert picture of the Avengers), men subconsciously perceive that as sort of "fair." 33% women, the men perceived there were more women in the room than men. Not thought, perceived - like, when they looked at a picture, they thought there were too many women. Men are the assumed default in society, and essentially invisible at times like this - which means that "equal" means "more of the men that I don't really even notice, they're so ubiquitous!" As the 1950s proved, that's a vicious cycle that wouldn't end until Betty Friedan...

I did slip stuff like that tentacle pic into the presentation, just to see the look on his face XD And no, assignment in the case of an art college tends to mean somewhat insipid work, done for a grade... But yeah! I like to fuck around with plots, since they give me the opportunity to grind characters against each other X3

I once read a statistic that spoke of, like, 90% of fatal work accidents happen to men, which is mostly because of the fact that they usually do stuff like oil rigs or mining, professions not really sought out by women. That's only partially because of upper-body strength, but even more because of manly machismo, like you said. Having balls would mean looking out for them better and keeping them safe, one could assume, but apparently not.

I'm only glad working in retail (where there are appr. 80% women employed) will ensure me a long life. Maybe it's my gayness that makes me accept low payment and no perspective on a career on which I can push competitors for promotions aside and die of a heart-attack before I'm fifty XD

But that's really interesting, that a third women in a group is already being perceived as "too much". There is of course the phenomenon of the Smurfette, and the Avengers are guilty of it as can be. Such movies are often regarded as "sausage fests", and even though I like sausage, even I notice it. Hollywood, you are fucked up. Go stand in a corner and think about what the hell you're doing. Until that, you will be ignored by me XD

So you tried to apply the tentacle painting, that's awesome! That face I would've liked to see as well I wonder how my hunky guys in girly outfits would fare at such an occasion

In this economy, they are sought out by women, but sexism in the hiring practices usually keep them out, even for the jobs that don't require upper body strength.
Anyone who says that men are stronger as a justification for something, ask them "Stronger for what?" The uterus is the most powerful muscle in the human body by a huge margin, if all your muscles were uterus strength you could lift 800 pounds. They're stronger where they need to be. (And if anyone dismisses cramps, remind them of this.)

You don't have the angry competitive instinct... I'll remind you you still live with your parents X3 In this country you'd probably be unemployed and living on a boyfriend's couch; low-wage retail jobs are ferocious and catfighty and usually ensures a short short life.

The Bechdel Test is an absurdly low bar that Hollywood STILL refuses to jump over, that's the point. There's no excuse. "But there's no place in this story to include more women!" Why did you push forward on a story that only focused on men? Has nobody suggested a good story that has women in it? These aren't even for the gay male gaze, these are for the straight male egocentrism.

He had a beard, so it wasn't very visible... And again, use your discretion.

Well, I guess it's the same sexism that keeps men out of hair stylist and retail jobs for the most part

Here in rural Austria there is the tradition that men move out from their parents when they get married, which will be never in my case XD Well, except if we get same-sex marriage, and me finding the right guy...still unlikely, I guess. In my case I'm at least safe from catfights, since I'm the only employee at my job Also, "catfights"? That's sexist

That reminds me of what a professional mountaineer said why there are no exclusively female expeditions in the Himalayan mountains. He said "they just would get in catfights all the time". And then they did a expedition just like that, with a dozen of world-class mountaineers that were all women. It's been the only one of its kind so far, and therefore I'm not sure if it is indicative in any way that the expedition DID fail because of arguing within the team Maybe there are genetic reasons. I once heard a dog trainer say that male dogs fight for domination, and the moment one male turns submissive, the fight is over. Female dogs when they fight, on the other hand, usually fight to the death and know no mercy.

The number of jobs men are kept out of are much much fewer than vice versa. "Manufacturing" and "hair styling" aren't at all the same size fields, let's remember how much of the world is heterosexual.

Hmm. Rural is right! Over here, if you're in Kansas or something, when you leave high school you're expected to either get married and get a house, get a house on your own, join the army and then get married after the four-year hitch, or go to the city - anything but be in your parent's house at that age. I say "expected," because that's how it was until about a decade ago; since the recession, people have lived with their parents to a European extent, and it prompts no end of articles whining about our entitled lazy youth, and bemoaning the parents whose kids haven't moved out... Now buy a house!
The sexist part is that we assume "catfights" to be all women. I've known guys who would totally hold catfights if they didn't think it would make them look emasculated. :P

"There would have to be some downsides to having a woman president, right?" Eggggh. And this guy never considers that maybe society doesn't encourage women to climb mountains in the same way it does boys...
Okay, it took two hours, but I looked through every tumblr post I'd saved a screenshot of for this, alphabetically - in a 741-image list from "10 year old white boy on xbox live" to "Zzzz, oh no, I have offended a heterosexual" - it was saved as "Why mysterious." Two hours of searching well spent.
But someone did put forth their theories on why straight boys all think women are argumentative and confusing, from their experience.
1) Women actually being quite clear, but not telling men what they want to hear. ”She said she doesn’t want to talk to me? So many mixed messages and confusing signals!”
2) Women not having cheat codes. ”I tried being nice, and she didn’t have sex with me. I tried being an asshole, and she didn’t have sex with me. Come on, there’s got to be some kind of solution to this puzzle!”
3) Women not being a hive mind. ”First a woman told me that she likes guys with big muscles. Then the very next day a woman told me she thinks muscles aren’t attractive at all. Make up your mind, women!”
4) An individual woman doing something confusing, and instead of asking “why is she doing this now?” men ask “why do women always do this?”

It can certainly be said that male dogs, in my experience, fight over nothing, at the drop of a hat, partly as a way of establishing dominance. When the females start fighting, there's a reason or a resentment, and shit's going down. Boys will be boys, in every species. (I think when it comes to animals, pregnancy and the resources used sort of give you a bit of perspective, since the girl and boy puppies certainly mock-fight at the same rates.)

Hehe, I had to laugh at that comic strip. So true in many cases. Yeah, let’s go buy a house. My father bought the property where our house is on in 1960 for 6000 Schilling, our currency we had before the Euro. That’s, like, 600 Dollar in today’s currency. Nowadays a house plus property would be in the 6-digit area, sometimes even the property alone. Not gonna happen for me, but it doesn’t need to, thankfully, and not just because I’m not straight and won’t go the approved way of getting married and creating offspring. Life is easier once one does file for divorce from the expectations of society, I tell you

I personally don’t think that a female president would be any different than a male one. They don’t need to argue with anyone since they’re, well, president (at least that is how I imagine it XD). But we here in old Europe are way more progressive than you guys anyway, since Germany has a female chancellor (who is head of government, unlike the actual president there) for years now. Works out pretty well, so get your shit together and make Hillary president! It would be, one could say, hill-arious XD *slaps himself*

About the female mountaineers, I can tell you a little story about Austrian culture. As it is often with rural farmland, when it comes to work on the farm, there isn’t much gender-bias happening for simple reason of necessity. When it came to climb steep hills for work, both men and women are in for it equally. For that reason there isn’t really a point in discouraging girls from becoming mountaineers here, usually.

Austria being the super-progressive place it is, it has not only the first trans-person to win the Eurovision, it also has the first woman to ascend all 8000-meter peaks of the Himalaya without the aid of artificial oxygen (we also had the first man to do that at all, so yay us XD). Her name is Gerlinde Kaltenbrunner, and she was actually encouraged from a young age to bring her talent and gift to use (at the very first by a catholic priest, get a load of that XD). While world-class mountaineering it still a mostly male business, probably because of hormone-induced competitive aggressiveness, amongst other things, there are women there, and we celebrate them…mostly because of national pride, but, oh, well.

Speaking of women and the clichés you cited: while I avoid Tumblr, I can speak from the experience in my job, and there is a certain occurrence that happens quite often to me. The scenario is like that: couple enters store, HE says SHE needs hiking boots. We start trying on different shoes, and not a single one fits, according to her words. While that is possible, although unlikely, I’m more baffled that HE doesn’t notice the incredible passive-aggressive look she has all that time. Every time I hand her another pair of shoes to try on, she looks at me like I just tried to grope her private area. After a while, the farce usually ends by them leaving, with him still wondering why none of the dozen of hiking shoes she tried did fit her feet.

It’s not so much confusing on her part, since her resentment is pretty obvious, but more that women like her are unwilling to admit the truth, which is that she doesn’t want to go hiking with him. While it may be the other way around at times as well, that’s an example that stands out for me. Maybe it’s a remnant of times when being abandoned by your husband for disobedience meant certain doom for you as his wife, who knows. It’s kinda sad, because even if she joins him, there won’t be much enjoyment for her in it, probably. I don’t think it requires being gay to sense that much resentment. Men can be pretty confusing, I tell you that

hehe~

A nice mug of flowerbeer? Coming right up~

That dragon looks so awesome!

You should see her when she's sobbing her lungs out... which is about half her waking hours XD She is awesome, but she'll never tell herself that.