#i could write an entire essay about what i hc gender roles in yharnam to be like

[sunieepo]

one of my biggest pet peeves with the bloodborne fanbase (from reading fics, mostly) is that everyone assumes that gender roles in yharnam were the same as gender roles in irl victorian england

...but this is textually not true. yes bloodborne is heavily inspired by victorian england but it's definitely not exactly the same. for starters, obviously, yharnamites worship eldritch gods which isn't at all in line with the cultural values informed by following christianity (i dont think i need to elaborate on what i mean by this)

the most obvious low hanging fruit example is vicar amelia, who is laurence's successor and current head of the healing church... and a woman, something that would never be allowed in victorian england era christianity (and honestly isnt even allowed today in many denominations)

the other which is slightly more obscure but even more valuable is that yharnamites are, in-canon, heavily inspired by the culture of the pthumerians. whether yharnam was literally built in the name of pthumerian queen yharnam or if it was simply named after her later is unclear, but the yharnamites evidently hold pthumerian society in high regard. and the pthumerians were almost certainly a matriarchy (female rulers, and only women were embalmed in coffins). i think of pthumerian to yharnam the way one might think of what rome was to the european countries later influenced by it.

other little things are:

the existence of gratia: an old hunter who was a woman renowned for her physical prowess. not very "womanly", yet clearly exalted by the church; item description refers to her as heroic

clothing details: most clothing items have very little differences between male and female hunters. most notable that does off the top of my head is that the church set for women has stiletto heels, which i think falls in line with my belief that most women of the church were blood saints. nevertheless, you do fight a pair of female church hunters in the dlc who seem to have no issue kicking your ass in said heels. this could be said to be due to game dev laziness, but importantly there are sets that Do have gender differences (like the cainhurst set...)

cainhurst: cainhurst is commonly pointed out by fans as the "odd one out" for its matriarchal vibes, so people assume yharnam must not have been. i agree, but that still doesnt mean yharnam had the same gender roles as the ones we have irl. in fact if anything, theres a distinct lack of emphasis placed on gender in cainhurst item descriptions or even alfred's hateful ramblings; although we assign misogynist intent to him, pointedly what he (and item descriptions) take most issue with isnt the #feminism, but rather cainhurst's obsession with nostalgia and bombast.

this isnt to say that yharnam had No gender roles. it did. just Different ones. (and im not saying it was a matriarchy either btw.) the existence of blood saints indicates that women likely were relegated to religious roles in yharnam. women who could not become blood saints probably became hunters of the church. characters like yurie also show that amelia wasnt an isolated case; women also comprised some amount of choir members as well, indicating that they likely regularly held high positions within the church hierarchy. additionally, lady maria being one of the byrgenwerth scholars indicates that women were allowed as students alongside their male peers, even if they may have been less common. all of these things are markedly different from how victorian gender dynamics were.

its just a bummer because i actually think the gender dynamics of bloodborne are super unique and interesting and are way more nuanced than a simple "women and men swap roles" type thing. but then all these fans who claim to be bloodborne loreheads just supplant irl victorian england gender roles into yharnam and call it a day when that is like... at best lazy/uninspired and at worst directly contrary to canon.

i rly mean no hate ofc (ive even enjoyed reading fics that include such things, even if i disagree with them heavily) and im happy to discuss these thoughts further, i just want to draw attention to smth about the bloodborne lore that i think is sadly overlooked because, when it comes to bloodborne and its feminine themes, ppl get much more caught up on the more overt pregnancy symbolism (which is understandable, but doesnt exist in isolation of the above). i have a lot more to say on this topic but this post is already getting long enough so ill just stop there lol