Indeed, when I first started playing the drums I discovered that in hitting the high hat, you use a special muscle that is not normally used, my mother cooks a whole lot and when she stirs the pot she uses that muscle... she could play longer than I could

 So girls can really be strong. My little sister (who is 7) can pick up a ten year old off the ground!
I'm sure if there was a girl that was born into a "kingdom" that believed in women in battle, she would be almost as capable as everyone else!

But whether or not they should is something to talk about.

Oh yeah sorry for not being too clear (my mom was telling me to get off her computer NOW!) My main point was that if you are going to have girls fighting with weapons don't make them have no muscles! (The Last Legion, Prince Caspian etc. (I mean really, there's no way you could throw an arrow from your hand, hit accurately and pierce mail!)

Abby/Princess, Thanks for correcting my "foolish" brother ...*laughs* If you hadn't the conversation at the dinner table tonight might not have gone over too well...
LOL, I'm totally joking...

Oh, no! I knew what you meant! I was just adding on to that!

Oh, okay! Sorry... I misunderstood you.

And piercing mail by throwing an arrow would be quite a feat, even for a guy!

Indeed! Even for an elf!

Yes, quite difficult to pull that off... Or, to combined what Princess and Svensteel said, it would indeed be quite a feat even for an elf guy!

Okay, so.... I read all the posts on this very interesting topic, And now I am thinking over some of the things I have in my book.

My main character is a girl, around the age of sixteen. But to make the long story short, she got stuck with a party of warriors who are going to try and kill the main villain. The warriors are both gender, and after some time Lanna (Alina...yes, my username, but I would just like to make it clear that Lanna/Alina is not my real name!) joins and gets trained as a warrior and goes along with them.

Because of her age and gender, she cannot, like Daniel pointed out, wear a full suit of heavy chain mail and metal armour. That's not a problem though, because I have her use hardened leather armor (There is such a thing! I didn't make it up!).

I realize that she cannot take on four men, all bigger and stronger then her, and beat the tar out of them. But she can take on one or two.

But now I will stop with the rambling and get to my question! (I do a lot of rambling, ask my brothers if you don't believe me... )
Would it be okay for her to be in battle using not a bow, but a light sword?...

I know many of you have already covered that, but it is kind of vital to my story... In the beginning of the book she is not a Christian but near the end she becomes one. So do you think that would make it more okay, her not knowing it should have been left to more capable and stronger people, and not a weak, peasant girl?

So, what I was thinking is that maybe I could have her be a warrior until she realizes it's not her job to go to battle, and then later be an archer in the back or something like that. But, this creates a problem in my plot and what I have planned for the end of the book... Any ideas? As you can see this creates a problem for me....

~The not Lady Alina Cabrera ...but you can call me that if you wish, seeing as you don't know my name

Well, if she ends up in a fight all around her, she should probably just use the sword and use the terrain to negate any disadvantages she might have.

Nicely said, Varon.

Alina, I think having her step down from the battle after her beliefs change is a very worthy and realistic arc. However, I would like to add that if you feel called of God to change this part of your novel, do it! I don't care how much of the book you have to change, do it! If God is calling you to make a change, you won't be happy until you do. But if you do it, no matter how sticky it is to work iron out the plot, you'll love your revised book and it'll be stronger for it.

Speaking from personal experience...

Yes, they do fight, but if I am not mistaken (and quite often I can be) then they fought as archers. This would remove them (somewhat) from the fighting and hide the emotions on the man-that-you-just-shot's face...

Changing it might also depend on whether you're feel you're actually called to change it or if it is for a different reason.

I believe Susan had a bow but Lucy was just an after-battle healer. She never actually used her knife.

Lady Alina whatever your name is, (she's my sister) I would have her use a recurve bow as they are lighter and easier to shoot. (maybe Mongol style) And give her a light short sword or long dagger in case it comes to melee combat.

Thanks Phili and Varon.
I think I will make her step down after she realizes it's the right thing to do.

This makes my plot much more interesting....

Yeah Daniel, I already have her using a light one handed sword and that bow of whatever-it-was-called...

Here is a link about the recurve bow if you are interested.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recurve_bow#Recurve_bow

Thanks Tsahraf!

Ooh, cool!

@Lady Alina



I agree with Philli. You see, I used to be quite the feminist, once upon a time. I did things then that I do not do now. I learned a different way of living and looking at the world. My feminism heavily affected my thinking. After I realized my sin, I began to react to things differently, speak differently, and even think differently.

I think it would be cool to add this into her character arc, myself personally.

That would be really cool Airianna, I think I'll do that. Thanks so much!

Thanks for listening to our rambles. That was a lot of posts to read.

No, thank you for posting them!. It really helped me with what I'm writing about, and I've already noticed the change to my writing after I've added this topic in.

So thank you so much every one who had a part in posting something in this!

*is proud of HW *

Aren't we all?

Well, probably, but I am more proud of HW sometimes, than I am of other times.

I've been thinking about this for a while. I think that women are made differently than men. They aren't equipped to handle war in the same way. However, I'm playing with the idea that a race that isn't human might be different. Think of the dwarves in LotR. Men and women are built much the same. So if you had a race where women weren't the fragile gender, where they were equal, perhaps the women from that race would battle. I'm considering doing this. Halfelven - at the moment - are built much the same either way. Men aren't much stronger than women. It makes no difference. Thus I would let my halfelven character fight, but the human girl will probably be given different duties. It's evident that she isn't created to fight, but Aislinn is. Does that make sense? Just a bit of another idea. But from a human point of view, a woman should be capable of defending herself but not one to go to battle.

That brings up an interesting theological point, Aldara. Obviously humans were created as they were for a reason, with the differentiation between the sexes. I wonder how that influences our portrayal of say, dwarves, or elves, where this is not the case: where women are equals or even superior to men?

*thinks* I may start a thread on this, so not to derail.

eru

That doesn't erase the real argument, though...It's not just, "Can women?", it's also, "Should women?"
God bless,
Crushmaster.

Aldara and Eru, that's a very interesting thought. I think another thread on that should be started so we could discuss that further.

*goes to do so*

eru

I think it depends on how you're writing. Most of the time, I would say no. However, in one story I was writing, the army was an allegory for God's army, which includes every believer, and thus women. So there were women in the army, though they were shown clearly to depend more so on their husbands (if they had them) than being independent-Amazon-warrior-types.

Of course. Disregarding the new idea, I would say that if God created them for other things, then they should not. It's only if, as in the example, they were created to have that ability that they should. If God didn't create them with a capacity for battle, then He probably doesn't want them battling, in which case they shouldn't be doing it. Make sense?

I started reading this thread around 10:00 PM. Finishing reading closer to 4:00 AM. If my clarity degenerates toward the end, please take the sleep deprivation into account.

Humans were not designed for conflict - not physically, not mentally, not emotionally. Neither men nor women were designed for war, nor to witness atrocities and be unphased by the experience. Violence is a result of the fall of mankind, and witnessing and participating in violence takes its toll on people of both genders. As I read through here I get the impression that we're supposed to keep the discussion tuned toward fiction rather than fact, but if you google "PTSD soldiers" you can find plenty of evidence that supports my theory. My main point is that God didn't intend for men or women to be better suited to combat.




Violence desensitizes everyone. Truth be told, I was much keener to visit Middle Earth before Peter Jackson's films came out and I got a good look at what fighting the Uruk Hai looked like. However, if I watched those scenes enough that they became old hat, other battle scenes would have far less impact on me. I don't think the male brain is wired so very differently that this wouldn't be the case for a man. The story about the students who were rather nonplussed watching footage of 9/11 because they'd been on a mental diet of Grand-Theft Auto their entire short lives would seem to bear that out.




To provide a bit of information you may not have had at your disposal:
The Cherokee were a matriarchal/matrilinear society, as were several other tribes, and not all of the women were meek little mice who catered to their savage men-folk's every whim. There were roughly 500 nations on this continent when the Europeans arrived, with widely varying cultures - best not to tar them all with the same brush. More likely, the warriors had seen how white men treated their women and assumed that white women were pushovers. ~_^ *Puts her 1492 Homeland Security T-shirt back in the drawer*

(And I've seen enough hints and snippets of your views on matriarchy/feminism to render me very curious - I'd be interested in learning more about your experiences/viewpoint via PM.)

That said, I like the distinction you make between fighting and participating in organized combat. I may not agree with your perspective on the latter 100%, but I appreciate it.


*Pulled section regarding real-life women in military, with much quiet grumbling.* I'm a former Technical Writer for the PATRIOT Missile System. Just put me down as seconding Lyndsey.



Sickening touch? Really? Wow. Well, in the interest of sparing you any possible queasiness, I'll warn you in advance that you probably won't think that my writing honors God.




*Clicks "Like"*

Regarding pagan women warriors... Why does it follow that any and all notions of a woman warrior must be based in paganism? Have you never imagined something only to find out that someone else had also thought of it, long before you did, yet you'd never heard of it before? My sister invented the peanut butter and jelly sandwich in 1981. True story.

And now having worked my way to the end of the thread, my thoughts are too scrambled to provide a rundown of my perspective. There's always tomorrow! *passes out, mumbling about the folly of beginning to read intriguing multiple-page threads after two in the afternoon*

*smiles * Yes, I was very aware of that information. I have studied many cultures, the Indian ones being among them. While it is true not all Indian women were as I described, it was the norm. There are many accounts of white women shocking the Native Americans because of the difference in the cultures.

My story is very long and very in depth. You are welcome to ask questions. I’m pretty firm in what the Lord has shown me in my life, and one of those things is that women should never be defenseless, or helpless.

Eh, by that logic, it was also the "norm" for women native to any continent if you insist on lumping them all together. However, I doubt a derailment into the realm of ethnic stereotyping would be as welcome as any other tangent... which is to say, not welcome.



But back to the topic at hand, and focusing on how I'd likely deal with the topic in my own work...

As far as Lewis's "Battles are ugly when women fight" perspective, I've long associated that statement with the notion that yes, by the time your seasoned and experienced professional soldiers have fallen and you're desperate enough to be sending anyone who can hold a sword into the fray, the battle would very ugly and grim indeed. "If I were queen..." and therefore had the authority/responsibility to arrange my country's defenses, I'd give women every opportunity to receive the same types and levels of military training that were available to men. If they wanted to study for knighthood, great! If I could scrounge together a troop of infantrywomen, fantastic! That particular troop might not end up on the front lines, but they could surely hold down and defend a supply line, or ably defend the capital if we didn't manage to stop the invaders further out. My last line of defense should be as well trained as my first line of defense. Whether I had integrated combat units, or kept the troops in units separated by gender would probably depend a great deal on my worldbuilding for that particular story, the individual characters involved, and other factors (such as whether I'm dealing with all humans or a mixed bag of species). And, if a woman proved herself able, willing, and a good choice for the job, she might end up as the exception to the rule and lead a group in battle. For one thing, it's more fun to write about exceptional people than about boring, commonplace ones.

Would I have placed an Éored of horsewomen in the first charge at the Pelennor Fields? Probably not. Would they have been hanging back to provide additional support and/or to assist with rescuing the wounded (and defending each other from the odd straggling orc while they did so)? Quite possibly.

C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien are great ones even though they did not escape its sickening touch. You may be a great one even if you do not escape its sickening touch. However great you become you will be greater if you follow God's will in this, and I hope I can help you to that decision.



The Bible does say that women are the weaker vessel, but it does not address whether they are too weak to go to war. I do not have enough well documented facts to argue this point myself, but meanwhile it is every man's God given duty to protect women and children, by keeping them off of battlefields as well as by going onto them themselves, and God's Word records this as law.

Well, personally, I think that one reason for keeping women off the battlefield is actually its affect on men. Even if women can be just as competent in battle (which they can, as long as physical strength isn't needed) and there aren't any additional psychological issues (which I wouldn't know), it doesn't mean that we should put them in battle. Now, I don't have any personal experience with this, so I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure that men will generally be more likely to do stupid things in battle to protect or rescue a woman than a man, as well as being more likely to do something stupid simply because there's a woman watching. Married couples in particular are probably a bad idea. There are also issues such as rape.

Also, when you're fighting with weapons that rely at least in part on strength, such as swords, which is usually the case in fantasy stories, the issue of strength is probably a sufficiently good reason to keep women out of battle.

You wouldn't, by chance be a military brat, would you? My Daddy (marine of 16 years and medically separated) mentions this very point when discussing this subject.

No, not me. It's good to know that someone who would have at least some idea of what it's like agrees, though! I think I saw someone say something related to this once, and then I thought about it and expanded on it, so the idea may have come from someone in the military, I don't know.

*nods * It was a basic overview of thoughts expressed by my father in discussion. And my Daddy has pre salvation and post salvation thoughts to draw from.

Not handling violence well is not unique to women. Plenty of men come back home and suffer from PTSD (post traumatic stress disorder.) I happen to believe that women are indeed just as brave as men. We were not built for fighting, but that doesn't mean we cannot be strong when the situation calls for it.

As far as women in battle in my stories, I use them sparingly. And I'm toying with the idea of having a warrior maiden. But if I write her she won't be some dainty, ultra-feminine thing who wears next to nothing in combat where she beats all the boys. She'll probably be large and fairly masculine, because that's much more realistic.

I think it all depends on the situation. While I agree that a girl shouldn't just run out and beat everyone singlehandedly (how realistic is that? Really?), I think they should be allowed to fight in armies and such. Also, the MC of my book is a girl prophesied to defeat the dark king. She fights, as do most of the females, because the population of this race is so small and every person is trained-both strength training and fighting-from school age on until they're 18, when they're allowed to choose a career. Everyone needs to be able to fight, because if an attack large enough takes place, everyone needs to be able to step up and defend their home. But as for a half-naked woman beating up all the guys, that's just stupid.

Yeah, I agree. Females should be equipped to be able to fight and defend themselves, though I don't think they should go to battle if there is enough men.

Yeah, most of the time in my stories the women stay with their families. Women are a lot less common as fighters. But they ARE there, just not wearing bikinis and wielding gigantic swords with skinny little arms

Uh...*Laughs*

Glad to be of service

I admit I didn't take 2.5 hours to read through this whole thread, so it's very possible that something like this has been mentioned already, but...



Just saw this. I'm not sure if that renders what I'm going to mention off-topic or not, but here's hoping (and kinda thinking) it doesn't!

I just watched something about the Roman empire, when they were attacking one of the northern barbarian tribes' camps it said that the battle "took a strange turn" when the women of the tribe came out of the tents armed with swords and started fighting...even when they were gashed and cut the biographer or whatever recorded that "they did not lose spirit until the end"...I thought that sounded pretty epic in a way...heartbreaking in another.

I think that in that real-life case the women fought for their own homes and families, which explains why they endured all injury until they were killed.
I also feel that it was a proper time for them to do so. I get the feeling somewhere that women have a tendency to care for their children, and if this should mean (in certain cases) that they take part in fighting, then so be it.

Anyway, I'm most certainly going to have something like this in my writings, I think it portrays a woman's drive to protect her children and stand by her husband in those sorts of cases.

Anyway...hopefully this isn't completely old material that's already been covered here.

It's okay Wolf, I didn't read all the way through either That sounds interesting, what were you reading exactly?

You know, Wolf, there comes a time to surrender . . .

Roman treatment of conquered peoples was generally pretty good; they probably could have worked out a better solution than having their women torn open on the battlefield.

I was watching a history DVD about the Roman Empire.



I suppose in that case maybe so, though it sounds like the women decided to join in on their own...I wasn't saying it was a good solution, but in the case that everyone is going to die if victory isn't achieved, I think that it is admirable that the women joined in to protect their children.
I do not know what would have happened if they had surrendered, but I think they would basically have all been executed, because they had already tried to negotiate for land instead of war.
Anyway, I'm not saying I'm going to have women in battle for "epicness" or something...it will usually not happen at all in most battles. I'm saying that when they figure out they've been basically devoted to destruction they will fight to the last person to avoid that.

Sam, I think I would have to agree with Lycanis here. A mother, who knows how to fight, (and even one who doesn't) would fight to the death to protect her children. There is a reason why you should never threaten a kid when their mother is around