I’m been thinking about how different and interesting SFF would feel if we stopped asking authors (with clear surprise) ‘Why did you NOT make your fantasy world sexist?’

And instead asked, ‘Why did you decide to make this world sexist?’

At the moment, sexist worldbuilding is treated as the default, the staple ingredient of fantasy.

But I think if we reframed the conversation, we’d have (1) some thought-provoking discussions, and (2) fewer lazy and/or autopilot cases of ‘because it’s medieval’ etc.

This hearkens back to my tweet about male authors writing misogyny – it’s not that I think they never, ever should. But I feel SFF enables them to do it thoughtlessly, automatically, without stopping to ask themselves why they’re doing it, because no one will question them.

We've let phrases like ‘it's medieval’ and ’I'm just showing the brutality of the world as it was’ slide without question for years. We've created a genre in which misogyny is the expectation, and its absence is the aberration, and that doesn't feel right.

And again, it's absolutely not that I think authors should never write sexism – I've never said that, and never will. Fantasy can be an incredibly effective mirror for real-world truths, and authors must always have the space to use it in that way.

When I say we should ask ‘Why did you make this world sexist?’ – I don't mean that in a confrontational way, but as a genuine question. (I am likely to explore sexism in future works myself.)