Shop Talk Writers : Who's what?

Who's what?

This is an experiment. I'm going to give a very brief summary of some characters, in different stories I have written, and you tell me if you think the character is a man or woman, based purely on gut instinct.

1. Normal person. Missing daughter, their only interest for about 2/3 is in finding her, but eventually they explode with rage when it looks like she won't be found. Nearly killing the person responsible.

2. Suffering severe childhood trauma, this character loses their grip on reality. The story kicks into gear when they murder the hero's wife.

3. An assassin, while ostensibly sent to kill the hero, reasons that since their job is technically to find the man who murdered their employer's daughter, they will instead hear out the hero's claim that it was someone else, so that they know their paycheck is earned, and their employer is happy.

4. A highly trained, but very green stealth killer nevertheless comes incredibly close to offing our hero in an act of vengeance over the death of their brother, but dies viciously in the attempt.

5. Concentration camp survivor, despite being too young to even remember the camps, is convinced into a lucrative plot to rob gold from some Nazis.

6. Leader. Lethargic. Passes their work off to a second in command, until they learn this second is a ruthless warlord who murders children and the elderly without remorse, so they lock him away as punishment.

7. Psychic and pacifist, helps the police catch murders. Including a close relative. Despite being born into a family of career criminals, who try to take advantage of their "gift."

8. A supernatural figure who attempts to exploit the hero's grief, and his fragile mental state, by claiming to be the "angel of death"

9. A bigshot hires someone to evaluate one of his employees in secret. The employee catches on, and instead successfully convinces the evaluator that it is in his best interest to kill their boss, but this is also a double cross. The distrusted employee only wants to impress their boss with "loyalty," the evaluator is shot in the back, just as the suggested hit is about to be carried out.

10. A religious person, non-violent in principle but exceedingly mean and nasty. Swears a lot.

--
There's no such thing as the establishment. Everyone knows that!

Re: Who's what?

1. Female

2. Male

3. Female

4. Female

5. Male

6. Male

7. Female

8. Male

9. Male

10. Male








My smile is stuck, I cannot go back to your frownland.

Re: Who's what?

I want to see what others think - if they'll play along - before I show a tally.

But I'm curious whether you're genuinely basing this on your own instincts or if you are allowing your thoughts to be guided by your perception of my personal opinions. It's probably not possible to avoid that anyway, but, out of curiosity... to the best of your knowledge, that's what you would assume?

--
There's no such thing as the establishment. Everyone knows that!

Re: Who's what?

No doubt the fact that it's a game makes me think you're trying to trick people to a certain extent, but usually some element stood out that made me think male or female. Well, actually, most I felt could go either way, so I basically just went with whatever element happened to stick out to me.





My smile is stuck, I cannot go back to your frownland.

Re: Who's what?


the fact that it's a game makes me think you're trying to trick people to a certain extent


I'm pretty sure that says more about you than it does about me.

--
There's no such thing as the establishment. Everyone knows that!

Re: Who's what?

Um... I didn't mean that as an insult.

If you had a list of obvious stereotypes and every single male one was a male character and every female character was female, what would be the point?







My smile is stuck, I cannot go back to your frownland.

Re: Who's what?

Maybe it would prove to me that I'm not a very good writer. Or at least not good at characters. That would be kind of an important thing for me to learn. Maybe I don't realize I'm writing stereotypes. People tend to be pretty dense. Especially when it comes to themselves.

--
There's no such thing as the establishment. Everyone knows that!

Re: Who's what?

1. Normal person. Missing daughter, their only interest for about 2/3 is in finding her, but eventually they explode with rage when it looks like she won't be found. Nearly killing the person responsible.
-Boy. Mostly because as soon as I read 'missing daughter' I thought Liam Neeson.

2. Suffering severe childhood trauma, this character loses their grip on reality. The story kicks into gear when they murder the hero's wife.
-Girl. She killed the hero's wife because she wants him, I think?

3. An assassin, while ostensibly sent to kill the hero, reasons that since their job is technically to find the man who murdered their employer's daughter, they will instead hear out the hero's claim that it was someone else, so that they know their paycheck is earned, and their employer is happy.
-Girl. Just watched Kill Bill and when I read 'assassin' I thought Uma Thurman.

4. A highly trained, but very green stealth killer nevertheless comes incredibly close to offing our hero in an act of vengeance over the death of their brother, but dies viciously in the attempt.
-Boy. When I read 'highly trained' I thought Navy SEAL (your story may have nothing to do with SEALs, of course) and whatever may happen in the future, special forces people going out on missions and stuff right now are all dudes. I think.

5. Concentration camp survivor, despite being too young to even remember the camps, is convinced into a lucrative plot to rob gold from some Nazis.
-...could go either way...I'm going to guess girl, just because I'd write it that way. I remember reading Anne Frank in school and being really bothered when the teacher told us she died shortly afterwards in a camp. If I ever wrote about a holocaust survivor, it'd be a girl. Really, it'd be Anne Frank (me imagining the character as Anne Frank) but with a different name and going on adventures/experiences she never did in life.

6. Leader. Lethargic. Passes their work off to a second in command, until they learn this second is a ruthless warlord who murders children and the elderly without remorse, so they lock him away as punishment.
-Boy. Sexist as this may sound, no one understands the joys of laziness and lethargy like our testosterone laden people.

7. Psychic and pacifist, helps the police catch murders. Including a close relative. Despite being born into a family of career criminals, who try to take advantage of their "gift."
-Started off thinking girl. Changed my mind to boy when you mentioned a family of career criminals who he was expected to contribute to...I guess they could be gypsies where women are expected to be criminals too, but I was thinking more along the lines of a quasi-cosa nostra. No girls allowed.

8. A supernatural figure who attempts to exploit the hero's grief, and his fragile mental state, by claiming to be the "angel of death"
-Girl. Who better to manipulate a fragile dude(assuming heterosexuality, of course)?

9. A bigshot hires someone to evaluate one of his employees in secret. The employee catches on, and instead successfully convinces the evaluator that it is in his best interest to kill their boss, but this is also a double cross. The distrusted employee only wants to impress their boss with "loyalty," the evaluator is shot in the back, just as the suggested hit is about to be carried out.
-Dude. 'Bigshot' to me says dude. Bigshot has sexual connotations to me, like you use your status to attract sex partners and that's more of a dude thing. If you said 'successful' I would be more unsure.

10. A religious person, non-violent in principle but exceedingly mean and nasty. Swears a lot.
-Dude. (First impression was it's a girl; a nurse Ratchet type. 'Swears a lot' made me think dude.)

Re: Who's what?

I'm glad you provided your reasoning. I tried to be pretty definitive about who I was asking about. But it could be tough at times. Sometimes I had to change up the formula. In the case of addressing multiple characters, I'd try to give the other sexes away most of the time, to make it easier to tell who the question was about. So, you should at least re-read number nine before I lock in your answers. Only seems fair, I know the wording can be confusing.

--
There's no such thing as the establishment. Everyone knows that!

Re: Who's what?

Yeah, I read 9 wrong. I'm changing to girl. You said the evaluator was a guy, and from the set up I'm assuming he got seduced in a Double Indemnity kind of situation.

Re: Who's what?


1. Normal person. Missing daughter, their only interest for about 2/3 is in finding her, but eventually they explode with rage when it looks like she won't be found. Nearly killing the person responsible.
Male. I don't think a mother would give up and shift from saving her child to revenge as easily as a father might.


2. Suffering severe childhood trauma, this character loses their grip on reality. The story kicks into gear when they murder the hero's wife.
Female, but only because your description makes it sound like a love-triangle gone wrong kind of thing.


3. An assassin, while ostensibly sent to kill the hero, reasons that since their job is technically to find the man who murdered their employer's daughter, they will instead hear out the hero's claim that it was someone else, so that they know their paycheck is earned, and their employer is happy.
This is going to sound sexist, but female. This character chooses logic over instinct. I'm not saying all men are big dumb brutes, but the stereotype is that you're less practical and think more about the result than the method of getting there.


4. A highly trained, but very green stealth killer nevertheless comes incredibly close to offing our hero in an act of vengeance over the death of their brother, but dies viciously in the attempt.
Male. Again, this character is not using logic to think through the situation, but is acting on pure emotional rage.


5. Concentration camp survivor, despite being too young to even remember the camps, is convinced into a lucrative plot to rob gold from some Nazis.
Hard to say. If someone too young to remember the camps is robbing Nazis, they must still be fairly young. The Nazi regime was toppled fairly early. Anyway, all that aside, female. You mention convincing, which suggests this person isn't an adventurer, which while not always female, is most likely female. Plus, a female infiltrator would be less expected.


6. Leader. Lethargic. Passes their work off to a second in command, until they learn this second is a ruthless warlord who murders children and the elderly without remorse, so they lock him away as punishment.
Definitely male. Men have the privilege of being able to be leaders while being lethargic and dismissive about their work. They can get away with half stepping and still end up on top.


7. Psychic and pacifist, helps the police catch murders. Including a close relative. Despite being born into a family of career criminals, who try to take advantage of their "gift."
Probably male. Women tend to be more pacific by nature, so by virtue of mentioning the character's passive nature, you're suggesting he is male.


8. A supernatural figure who attempts to exploit the hero's grief, and his fragile mental state, by claiming to be the "angel of death"
Difficult to ascertain without knowing why this figure is exploiting the hero's grief.


9. A bigshot hires someone to evaluate one of his employees in secret. The employee catches on, and instead successfully convinces the evaluator that it is in his best interest to kill their boss, but this is also a double cross. The distrusted employee only wants to impress their boss with "loyalty," the evaluator is shot in the back, just as the suggested hit is about to be carried out.
I'm not sure which character is in question here. But more than one are referred to as "he."


10. A religious person, non-violent in principle but exceedingly mean and nasty. Swears a lot.
Again, highlighting non-violence in a woman seems redundant, so it would seem this character is male.

This would have been more interesting had we been given character profiles instead of plot synopses though.

----
Pidder Padder? Make my Heart go Boom Bap and Then We'll Talk!

Re: Who's what?

I can't exactly clarify further, that wouldn't be fair, so I have to take any non-answer as a forfeit. Not that it matters, it's really not meant to be a competition. I'm just saying.

--
There's no such thing as the establishment. Everyone knows that!

Re: Who's what?

Non answer?

----
Pidder Padder? Make my Heart go Boom Bap and Then We'll Talk!

Re: Who's what?

Yeah, for some of them you didn't take a guess.

--
There's no such thing as the establishment. Everyone knows that!

Re: Who's what?

Well, I was hoping some of the board regulars would give their opinions, but they don't seem interested, and since the whole site might as well be closing down.


1. Male
2. Female
3. Female
4. Female
5. Female
6. Male
7. Female
8. Male
9. Male
10. Male

--
There's no such thing as the establishment. Everyone knows that!
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