Nah, I reacted mostly to the comments about maned lionesses. It's a nitpick I've seen over and over again on just about every IT (or IT variant), FH, or roleplay forum I've been to. Sorry if I sounded overly defensive about it, like I said it's a personal pet peeve of mine so maybe I did over explain it a bit. As for the obscure facts, I pointed them out to back up my argument that what is considered unrealistic may not necessarily be. Sure, I don't expect everyone to know this. I point them out merely to get people to stop and think: if they realize that what they thought was unrealistic actually is realistic, it might get them to stop and question other things. This isn't about proving who knows more, it's about sparking conversation and pointing out things that people might find interesting and enjoy learning more about.
I mentioned that it's understandably annoying when people claim that their unrealistically designed characters are realistic, but also I mentioned that it can still be acceptable when the unrealistic design has a reasonable explanation attached to it. As for those who don't have such explanations and are insistent that their bright yellow lion is realistic, well, best to just ignore them and move on. The sad fact of the matter is, most of the ones to whom threads like this are addressed don't even go on the forums, and trying to explain these things in-game is nearly impossible. So, let them learn from their own mistakes: when enough people start ignoring them over it, they'll eventually either get the idea or leave.
(Also, I don't use Tumblr :/ Where'd you get that idea? Just curious
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EDIT: "People who assume lionesses don't have manes because they've never seen or heard of such a thing can't be accused of of having traditionalist views on gender... They just happen to not know that about lions. If I'd never heard of gynandromorphic birds and thought such a character to be unrealistic, would that make me traditional or sexist?"
To be fair, I wasn't really accusing anyone of that. I mentioned the gender binaries because usually, people assume "male" or "female" when they look at a character because that is all they normally see in reference to real life. However, that is not always what happens in real life--not all animals are strictly "male" or "female." I merely pointed this out and backed it up with facts.
Honestly though, the same can be said for those who create and play grey "TLK" hyenas. If all they know is that hyenas are grey because they saw grey hyenas in TLK, then isn't it treating them as less intelligent by constantly pointing out that they are wrong? I saw a picture posted on this thread that actually RANTED about it, and with far more hurtful language than anything that I used--is that any less condescending than what I said? And said picture backed up its facts with real images of hyenas, as well as interesting facts about hyena behaviors and social order. Anyone who plays a grey hyena could say, "how do you expect me to know all of that? I just want to have fun and play a hyena character, I don't have time to research all of those obscure hyena facts."
