I know just enough about battletech to know what this statement refers to, but not enough to know why it's funny or controversial. So I agree, because why not?
this post was submitted on 20 Jul 2025
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The Battletech books from before the Clan invasion had female characters written almost exclusively to be love interests. I'm re-reading them all and boy, are those parts cringe. There's only a dozen or so books pre-Clan, but if you read them you'll see what I mean. Most of the time, those characters can't pass the Bechdel test in scenes by themselves; they're constantly thinking about a male love interest no matter what's happening.
The Clans have a totally different culture where people are bred in vats rather than being born naturally, and are all about glory and combat. Sex exists for fun, but not romantic relationships (mostly). As a side effect, the authors of those books had to write female characters that didn't revolve around a man.
You'd think they'd talk about, gee, I don't fucking know, MECHS!?
As someone having just finished up through Twilight of the Clans, agreed 100%. Absolute cringe. Justin Allard will never not be a piece of shit in my mind because of his treatment of Kym in Warrior: En Garde. Luckily his son is a good kid.
I've read every novel (up until a year or two ago when I forgot to buy more) and I'm not sure that there's anything to this.
Long ago the inner sphere houses lived in ~~harmony~~ war, but that all changed when the clans attacked.
That's all the lore I know.
But they made a mistake when they attacked MY HOME PLANET!
Depending on how femcel you want to define the Bechdel test, I can think of at least one passing example:
Constance and Florimel Kurita have at least one conversation about Constance's career in Heir to the Dragon. Near the beginning of the book there's this whole "We're promoting you to O5P Adept, but you're never really going to be an Adept because you're going to immediately be Florimel's apprentice" conversation. Theodore's graduation from the academy is mentioned during this conversation, and a man is present and participates in the conversation.
Thinking through the Blood Of Kerensky trilogy, and not coming up with much that passes. There's a brief exchange between Tyra Myraborg and her wingman Nik wherein Tyra is basically saying goodbye before her suicide run. Natasha Kerensky and Cyrilla Ward briefly reminisce about their good old days before the conversation turns to Phelan. Ranna teases Natasha about being her "grandmother."