Between Pen and Paper

Apparently not, according to Bioware.

On the forum of their upcoming MMORPG, Star Wars: The Old Republic, there have been threads discussing the posibility of homosexual characters. Most of these have been closed now. However, the issue came to a head when a filter was put in place on the site, banning the use of words such as "gay", "lesbian", and "homosexual". The poster had this to say:

"Just wanted to point out that disallowing the usage of the words G-A-Y and L-E-S-B-I-A-N in this forum is something we (the GLBT community) cringe at witnessing. I understand where it comes from, but my advise to Bioware is to rethink this. Blizzard got some really bad press when they tried to forbid the usage of these words, and it would be really disappointing if Bioware would follow such a conservative policy in their forum - and their game."

In response to this, a few pages later into the thread, Bioware Community Manager Sean Dahlberg stated this before locking the topic:

"As I have stated before, these are terms that do not exist in Star Wars. Thread closed."

Coming from Bioware, this seems an odd move as they have given players the option to follow diverse romantic options in their previous games. In Jade Empire, female player characters could choose between seducing a male or female companion, whereas a male player character had even more choice - being able to choose between a male, female or even two female companions. In Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, there was lesbian subtext between the female player character and Juhani, a female jedi.

Whilst their reasoning may work if they want to exclude the restrictions of specific sexuality from the Star Wars universe, why not restrict use of all terms related to the subject, such as 'heterosexuality'? At the moment, this seems like needless conservative censorship and added explanation is required on their part to avoid further conflict with the LGBT community.

Even if everyone was in agreement that these terms weren't used in Star Wars mythos, the need for players to identify themselves and build their character is still present. I can see the point of restricting these words in-game but it makes little sense to censor such things on a public forum.