Enough already!

I used to work in the motorcycle industry for years, involved in marketing and sales and working at a lot of trade shows and one thing that was always present and you could not get away from it was... Scantily clad women.

There are some aspects of motorsport and the motor industry that are firmly stuck in the last century and REALLY need to catch up

Sadly fantasy and science fiction art were and to a lesser degree are, still very much similar. Women being used to sell genres and ideas, clad in little more than a bikini (sometimes metal) alongside the muscle-bound hero of the piece, of if the woman is the focus of the art work, wearing bugger all and draped over a large tiger or dragon.

ENOUGH ALREADY! The people that play fantasy and sci-fi games now are probably the most switched on generation with regards to gender and sex ever and I am not sure this use of the female form to sell things is necessary any more.

I am a member of an old fantasy art group on Facebook and if you look at the sort of people that post the pictures of semi naked women, it is predominantly white middle-aged and older men. The sort that had these sort of posters on their walls in the 80's.

And chain mail bikinis? WHY? What is the point? Even in some of the really popular fantasy artists are guilty of this, women warriors in totally pointless armour.

Armour is protection, it is there to stop you being made dead. Protecting your groin and breasts to the exclusion of everything else is just mindless, and clearly there again, to sell the artwork or the game, or the book.

This has all the main elements you need for cheesy sexploitation. Large cat, no armour of any worth on a woman famed for her fighting prowess.


If you insist on painting women and men with no armour who are fighters, please cover them in scars and lost limbs. You do not get out of a fight without armour without cuts, lots of cuts. They have examined the bones of people who were clearly fighters and they had massive disfiguring injuries. You don't get out of a fight unscathed... Ever. 

A skull found at the battle of Towton England, shows a fighter with a severe but healed facial wound. 

So, apart from being sexist, exploitative, these sorts of images, as skillfully done as they are, they are just not realistic. But but but… It's FANTASY! Yes... And? How many of you have fighters that have had a few hit points of damage in each combat encounter they have had? Do you think all those little cuts and bashes heal without leaving a scar? People scar, people get wounded, artsists are kind of ignoring this fact. Writers often do as well, with the odd exception. David Gemmell wrote of Druss that he was covered in scars, and he wore armour of sorts. David Gemmell did try to have a look at weapons and armour so he knew what they could and could not do at least. 

Modern Day Master | Thomas Christian Wolfe. Joan of Arc

It is totally possible to do it right and realistically in fantasy art, be inclusive. Don't be sexist, don't be racist and if you want to pander to the sad old sexists that sadly still exist, then expect your market place to die off.