Quote Originally Posted by Raistlin View Post
And late game, after you start branching out into other classes' abilities outside the original three, Vanille's improved healing ability is basically the only thing she has going for her.
You didn't use Vanille much, huh? She's often regarded as the best Saboteur in the game. To say her improved healing ability is the only thing she has going for her is absurd.

It could be argued that she gets the better healing spells earlier because of balancing. She's slower to cast and has a lower magic stat, but during the early game you have fixed parties and therefore the healers need to be balanced in order for them to both be effective in their respective parties. To balance the slower casting and lower magic stat, they simply gave her faster access to more powerful healing spells, meaning both of their respective parties could advance at a fairly even pace.

And regardless, context matters. I don't have to prove that Vanille was objectively the best healer to make my point. Despite signs of improvement, FF still had a history of relegating women to healing roles throughout the entire series.
Oh, regarding the entire series, I absolutely agree. I just think it's harsh to say that Vanille being a good healer is sexism when Hope is better. Don't get me wrong - I preferred Vanille to Hope, personally, despite him being the better healer. But to say that "oh, look, a female is the best healer, HO HO HO SEXISM SQUARE ENIX" is wrong, because if anything this game is the first game in about two decades where a male was arguably the best healer (and clearly labelled as such in the official manual) in the game. I guess, if anything, you could argue it sexist that she's the only one who receives a weapon that enhances healing.

I can understand how people might see her as the primary healer in the game, but she happily shares the healer role with Hope (a guy) and I do question whether or not it might be sexist for people to run around assuming she's the best healer in the game when she quite frankly is not. People just don't think about Hope as a healer because they're too busy assuming that as a guy he must therefore be a ravager first and a healer second.

In fact, the more I look at the sexism article you've presented, the more I'll happily point out that your entire article focuses on sexism towards females when every argument about a female being a resident healer in this game could just as easily be made about a male being a resident black mage. Snow is a walking stereotype, too, surely?