Talk:Kai'Sa/@comment-24971427-20180420025946/@comment-4068613-20180509035845

"actually all the male characters are also sexualized"

You're completely failing to draw the essential distinction between "idealized" and "sexualized". The problem arises from the fact that "sexualized" *is* widely regarded by popular media as the idealized female shape, and "powerful" is more often the idealized male shape.

Taric and Varus (and maybe Kayne and Rakan?) are probably the only real examples of explicitly sexualized male base skins in the game. And hell, most of Taric's reputation post-rework comes from his Fifth Age skin. Most of the characters, male and female, are designed to be visually appealing and conventionally attractive. But the fact that you can't tell the difference between a circus strongman and a barbie doll supermodel doesn't bode well for your sense of judgement.

Braum isn't _sexualized_. He is powerful and invincible. That's why he's shirtless, and that's what his entire design is intended to convey. You can find him attractive, but he was powerful first, and attractive as a consequence. The issue being taken is with every female character having "sexy" _in the original design notes_. Maybe it wasn't written down. Maybe it's just so deeply internalized that they don't even think of putting it on the list. But it's there, and it's pervasive.

The two most successful cases in terms of defying the "sexy supermodel" trope for women in this game probably lie with Illaoi and Kalista. The Supermodel Waif character template is always skinny, but Kalista is actually designed to look sickly and wasted. She's imposing, threatening, and uncomfortable to look at. Illaoi is more pleasing to the eye, but she's more of a Braum attractive than a Miss Fortune attractive. A strong and sturdy build, without exaggerated primary and secondary sexual characteritics. Powerful first, and attractive afterwards.

Xayah is another good example, managing to be obviously feminine without an exploitative visual design. But even generously including her and a couple other edge cases leaves you with a list of good examples of non-sexualization you can count on one hand.

Gangplank is muscular. But he doesn't spend every other animation frame in a stereotypically sexy pose, like Miss Fortune. Graves is rugged and charismatic, but he's also not exposing most of his thighs and buttocks like Akali and Soraka.

Don't confuse "showing some skin" with "visually sexualized". Kai'Sa is sexualized more by the skintight bodysuit than by the cleavage window, though it definitely doesn't help.