Your argument has nothing to do with the point everyone else is making. Nobody wants to have the discussion you're trying to have.
Zeo1fan, I have stated many times that nobody here is particularly interested in discussing the "distressed" trope. The only thing we're interested in is how you tried to reframe or rename the trope.
You said "The Damsel is not a gendered concept" and we said "yes it is."
You said "So I'll not use the word damsel and instead say dude" and we said "but the point we're making isn't that a dude can be in distress, but that 99% of the time it is a female, and until the number is 50% we're living in a sexist world."
You said "But dudes are in distress too, sometimes, so let's discuss this in more depth" and we said "no thanks, as that's not what this thread is about" even though I did engage you about that (see 90% and Star Wars posts).
You said "Let's take every side into account" and we said "you're coming off as sexist yourself."
My post is dripping with condescension for a reason. That you find it disheartening is what I'm hoping for. I want you to lose heart in trying to reframe this as a literary criticism issue, and maybe acknowledge that your approach and use of language comes off as sexist.
If you want to start another thread about literary criticism of video games, go ahead! The discussion there probably won't keep coming back to the same issue over and over again. Discuss all the tropes you want from any point of view. But in this thread, full of feminists who are trying to raise the consciousness of people exactly like you, you're probably not going to have much luck.
Again, it's BECAUSE you want to discuss this topic using phrases like "Also noticed your use of the words 'her' and 'she'" and think you're catching us out for being sexist, that's why you're failing.
She's getting better. I find I much prefer her interesting critical analysis to her examinations of tropes as plucked from TVTropes. The latter must exist for the uninitiated and so as not to exclude gamers without a wide berth of gaming knowledge, but it makes the videos less interesting/engaging for me.
I enjoyed the section on the Advertising side of this trope. I decided to check out the pokémon X/Y trailers to see how they stood on this since it has been a game with dual protagonists since third generation.
The UK television advert only has male actors in it. (It is a live action advert.)
I am glad that Thomas Was Alone was mentioned - that game made me cry both times I played it and it is amazing how much personification can be put into simple jumping quadrangles...I think I will play it again tomorrow.
The thing that I really noticed is that all of the examples in this video are AAA garbage non-games.
Even real games still have sexist tropes, but this one only exists in this one category, albeit an immensely popular category. But even so, these games are more popular on consoles than on PCs and more popular in the US than other countries.
I found this was the video that has most well-illustrated her points out of all the videos. It is ridiculous how many people seem fit to fill their fictional worlds with sexual violence/misogyny, and the ending really points out how ludicrous people's expectations are.
And yeah, AAA games are filled with this crap, and it sucks.
Eh. She talks some bollocks about Hitman - like, creating footage that's intentionally misleading - but whatever, I don't care anymore. It's like Michael Moore films - you know he's going to talk some bollocks and invent scenes to make his point, but fuck it, getting bothered isn't going to help anything.
Fuck, now there's a guy I haven't heard about in forever.
He's kinda slipped from the public conciousness after "Sicko", because a lot of the left started recognizing him as basically the Rush Limbaugh or Glenn Beck of the left, and started moving away from him - especially now that it was easier than ever for a lot of Cubans to speak out and be heard talking about the real state of their healthcare system - which, in short, can be summed up as "Moore's depiction is accurate, if you're a rich white american seeking medical treatment in Cuba, and you're willing to pay for it" which rather robbed Moore of the big Moore-esque spectacle piece of his film.
That wasn't helped by the absurdly self indulgent "Captain Mike Across America" - which was about students in 2003-4 before Bush's re-election, but came out in 2008 after Bush had left office, so it wasn't very popular as it was about as topical as a Vote Al Gore badge, as well as basically being ground he'd covered before, so a lot of people felt like it was a rehash. It got mostly ignored, but was released for free on the internet, where it still wasn't really that popular. "Capitalisim: A love story" in 2009 then failed to make back it's budget by a couple of million even including international money.
He's done one thing other than write insipid blogs and "open letters" on his website since, which was his autobiography - which was panned by critics as being disjointed, stuffed with filler, self-aggrandizing, and in some cases, quite heavily embroidered or embellished. Which is kinda suitable, when you think about it.
I wonder if she could list more games like Papo & Yo as examples of covering mature subjects in video games right using it in the matter of the storytelling and gameplay.
She makes several good points, but I do wish more coverage of other genres other than all the crime, sandbox games. The violent scenes in God of War 3 and No More Heroes 2 were good examples, but I'm curious to if she would point out games that try to be progressively female or feminist and failed at doing so.
Regarding threatening messages. Obviously only some kind of sick people would send them. Also, it's understandable how someone could be afraid of them.
But what I'm wondering is this. Has there ever been an instance where a stranger sent threats over the internet and actually tried to carry them out? My feeling is the people sending these threats are sad lonely people who are too afraid to leave the house and talk to someone, let alone do anything violent. Much like terrorists and people who send bomb threats, they win as soon as you are afraid.
Personally I wish I had threats and hate mail. It would be a signal that I have an audience and my message is making a difference. If someone ever actually tries to come at me, bring it on. It's much more likely to end positively in my favor.
Yes. It does happen. I remember on a recent SGU podcast, Steve Novella was talking about someone coming to his house (while his kids were home) after threatening him online.
However, I think the real issue isn't that if you get one message from one person, then that person will come over and try to harm you. I think the real fear is that if many, many, many people are sending threats, and the proposed violence is increasing, then it's a good sign that someone else, who hasn't sent a message, is more likely to turn up.
Also if, until now, there haven't been any threats delivered directly to a home address, and then some start arriving, that's another good sign that your home address is now out and about on the shady side of the internet, and that the likelihood of a physical attack has increased.
And god help you if you disagree with anything she says now.
By being rendered ash In the fires of hatred she's become a greek goddess of half truths about video games.
Indeed... It's one thing if you have an honest disagreement with her over something... but it's a whole other thing if you threaten to inflict bodily harm on her in the process of telling her why you disagree with her.
For example, I stumbled upon one of her twitter posts where she had a screenshot of a threatening email she had received. This email was talking about how someone had made a youtube video contesting her conclusions about the game Hitman. However, instead of politely asking her to respond to said video, the email threatened her with bodily harm for "saying lies about video games."
Even if you are correct that she is somehow lying about games like Hitman, threatening her with bodily harm is not the way to go about calling her out on them.
Even if you are correct that she is somehow lying about games like Hitman, threatening her with bodily harm is not the way to go about calling her out on them.
I believe the lie they're saying she told - an allegation that appears to be accurate, if I'm remembering the video correctly - is that Hitman places women in one section of one level where you pass through a strip-club, not only for you to kill in a number of ways, but outright encourages you to do so, and created footage to back this up.
What she's saying isn't true, is because the Hitman games actively discourage you from killing - or even being seen by, in many situations - innocent civilians. It doesn't even like you killing hostiles that aren't your target. What she's said about it is certainly a lie, and she created footage to back that up where she's performing actions the game very explicitly tells you that you shouldn't do, despite allowing it. Some people are extra offended by this, because there's a ton of examples she could have pulled that are genuinely as she says.
But that doesn't justify any level of threat. It's just talking bollocks to try and add weight to her point, not even worth getting aggressive over. You say something like "You're talking nonsense", you don't threaten to... anything, really, because it's not even worth the time, nor will anyone actually listen to you if you do. These people are fucking lunatics.
Yeah, I haven't had the chance to see that Hitman video myself yet, but from the description it does sound like it's exactly as you described. There are quite a few games where their open-ended nature allow you to do all sorts of horrible things but that don't necessarily reward you for it and may often penalize you for it. In this case, Hitman certainly seems to be one of those games.
If there's a separate thread for this please let me know. Thanks! Okay! I feel as though she is being real unfair to games, exaggerating a bit and using very specific examples in order to make blanket statements about gamers and how games affect us and our views of women. But other than that, her videos are fine. She has some points. I personally, would love to see more gender neutral games. Heck, that idea of a steampunk Zelda game, where Zelda is the protagonist, sounded pretty cool. Sexulization in games feels weird to play in front of others so I appreciate it not being there when it isn't. I feel gamers as a whole are better than this. That most of us don't care about "dem sexy ladies" as long as we get a good game. Now, a lot of tropes have been made that will be hard to find a substitute, but only by trying things, even bad ideas that don't end up working, the gaming medium will find a new way to breath life and story into it's games. That's how this gamer see's it anyway. And I feel I am the average gamer.
Context is everything. In any game your interactions are limited to the amount of inputs you have. The problem isn't just that the majority of these games rely on these sexist tropes, character stereotypes and clichés to motivate the player to progress; it's that there is often no real context for them to do so. By virtue of the limited inputs you're forced as a player to either be exposed to sexism or not play/ interact.
To accept the argument that these tropes are reflections of real world scenarios, you would also have accept that in the real world, same scenario, that the choices and consequences of those choices would also be the same. You might need to take a red pill if you think these games are realistic in their context.
If these scenes were more realistic, there would be more options available to the player, and maybe that might justify their use. However, like Anita points out (paraphrasing) they only exist because it's a cheap and lazy game way for game designers to motivate and stimulate the player.
For me personally, I've always recognised this in these types of games and not just thought it as stupid but mostly boring.
If environment interaction is key to the fun of the game I want more interactivity. I want to see more diversity in the consequences to as many minute decisions as possible. Not the repetition of the same decision. Repetition is only good for practice (conditioning). Which is mechanism design best suited for other things than killing prostitutes for example.
The repetition of these tropes across all industries is the core problem, because they reinforce the ideas that devalue and misrepresent the female gender.
The other point Anita makes, is the lack of interaction all together. That female characters are literally just sex objects. You cannot interact with them at all. You can argue that there's a lot that you can't interact with, but the focus of the argument is on the sexist kinds.
Context, strip club..
Argument, see! Naked female characters are where they would be in the real world.
Counter, this isn't the only context in which women are naked. These games rely on the stripclub scene as an excuse to have nude/ semi-nude characters in the game, to sex up and stimulate the player. To be inclusive of other context in which female characters are naked in a non-sexualised manner is unseen, because...(insert game designer reasons).
So why does context matter? For many reasons, including: making comparisons observing the effects judging the value of decisions
@Chruba Women as Background Decoration: Part 1 - Tropes vs Women in Video Games @21:41
Hitman: Absolution, take note of the points. What is the purpose and the value of those points with respect to the specific actions: within context of the game and then as a criticism of the game mechanic?
The argument isn't just that you can do that in the game, whether the player is encouraged or not. There are no mechanisms in the game to do anything else with those characters. There's no equal portrayal of women in the game as is with men. The exposure and interaction with female characters are reduced to the tropes mentioned in Anita's videos. If you're oblivious to these facts, then you need to look closer, even if you don't agree that it's a problem.
The short
These video games (despite what fun parts there are): they lack nuance, they're sexist and mostly boring. Recognise it.
She has some good points and the basis for some of her arguments are true but I'm not a big fan of hers. While her points may be true, many of her examples are flawed or flat-out lies like the Hitman example. And with the "Damsel in Distress" I get that its an old and sometimes sexist or at least not empowering one but its pretty exaggerated. I don't really buy that its all a male power fantasy about objectifying women into something they have to save. Its an overly used trope, but I think its mostly that many game developers aren't storytellers and this is an easy premise for a game. Sure its not empowering, but if she were kidnapped would she not want to be saved? If I'm rescuing someone from a kidnapper, its not because they are an object to me, its because its the right thing to do and people generally don't want to be kidnapped.
TL;DR She has a point but she's been intellectually dishonest at times/exaggerated claims.
There's no equal portrayal of women in the game as is with men. The exposure and interaction with female characters are reduced to the tropes mentioned in Anita's videos. If you're oblivious to these facts, then you need to look closer, even if you don't agree that it's a problem.
Pretty much. I love GTA5, but its kinda sexist. Its not sexist just because there is a strip club or ditsy/stupid/annoying female characters. Its sexist because they seem to be the only examples.
I think Anita could have a point if she actually bothered to do her research properly and not fudge what research she did do her favour like some two bit college student.
I acknowledge that makes me cis white pig scum to which I ask that you look at all the fucks I give about that.
Could a mod please fix the spelling on the title of this thread? I only just realized I made that mistake (I'd been avoiding the topic until recently), but it says I don't have permission to edit the thread anymore.
I think Anita could have a point if she actually bothered to do her research properly and not fudge what research she did do her favour like some two bit college student.
I acknowledge that makes me cis white pig scum to which I ask that you look at all the fucks I give about that.
So, your second statement is coming off as pretty hostile. You're clearly trying to mock and draw out the crowd that you think will find that offensive, which is pointless.
As for your point about research, I agree that it's lacking a bit. But the sheer number of games she covers with relative accuracy shows that she did buy and play a crapton of games. In order to get these out faster, she likely mostly is relying on the games themselves to prove her points. And they do, at the end of the day. A huge number of the most popular games that have come out for the last two or three decades have some kind of sexist portrayal of women in them. She just sorta points that out directly to all the people who will respond to a statement about sexism with "Where's your proof that games are sexist? I can show you all these games that aren't, so you can't prove anything!" She just uses overwhelming evidence from various games to make her point.
Is this the best video content? Not for anyone who's educated or has read TVTropes. But it's not targeted at us. It's targeted at the people who already really disagree with her and will fight her on her argument. The rest of us looking for something meaningful can look elsewhere. Her work is meant to be a very basic overview of sexist tropes that are used in games. I hope in a few years when she finishes this series, we can get some more detailed analyses where she can show the researching skills she hopefully got in grad school.
As for your point about research, I agree that it's lacking a bit. But the sheer number of games she covers with relative accuracy shows that she did buy and play a crapton of games. In order to get these out faster, she likely mostly is relying on the games themselves to prove her points.
Considering that she's not only got her own time, she's also got a full-time research assistant and her full-time producer/other assistant, I don't think that's a valid excuse, especially considering how long she takes with her videos. Nobody's asking for perfect or instant, but she doesn't have that as an excuse for the current lack, since she's got the available time and work output of not just one, but three people.
I acknowledge that makes me cis white pig scum to which I ask that you look at all the fucks I give about that.
So, your second statement is coming off as pretty hostile. You're clearly trying to mock and draw out the crowd that you think will find that offensive, which is pointless.
No, it's a statement of how much I'm done being called that for daring to have an opinion about the quality of the videos which I find to be sorely lacking that doesn't by and large fellate Ms. Sarkesian's ego.
I acknowledge that makes me cis white pig scum to which I ask that you look at all the fucks I give about that.
So, your second statement is coming off as pretty hostile. You're clearly trying to mock and draw out the crowd that you think will find that offensive, which is pointless.
No, it's a statement of how much I'm done being called that for daring to have an opinion about the quality of the videos which I find to be sorely lacking that doesn't by and large fellate Ms. Sarkesian's ego.
Can't find any record of you being called that so I think you trolled successfully? Maybe? I don't know what or who that comment was for.
As for your point about research, I agree that it's lacking a bit. But the sheer number of games she covers with relative accuracy shows that she did buy and play a crapton of games. In order to get these out faster, she likely mostly is relying on the games themselves to prove her points.
Considering that she's not only got her own time, she's also got a full-time research assistant and her full-time producer/other assistant, I don't think that's a valid excuse, especially considering how long she takes with her videos. Nobody's asking for perfect or instant, but she doesn't have that as an excuse for the current lack, since she's got the available time and work output of not just one, but three people.
I wondered about this myself but I'm not sure of how she has dealt with the responses to her videos. She certainly seems to have received more media attention.
Regardless if FNPL can go fortnightly, anyone can.
I wondered about this myself but I'm not sure of how she has dealt with the responses to her videos. She certainly seems to have received more media attention.
She doesn't, and that's the smartest course of action. Responding would just whip said responders, along with gamergate nowdays, into a frenzy that would result in a shitstorm of new videos, all hoping for a response, and with no response that would satisfy them. Better to just do her thing, and get it done.
Comments
You said "The Damsel is not a gendered concept" and we said "yes it is."
You said "So I'll not use the word damsel and instead say dude" and we said "but the point we're making isn't that a dude can be in distress, but that 99% of the time it is a female, and until the number is 50% we're living in a sexist world."
You said "But dudes are in distress too, sometimes, so let's discuss this in more depth" and we said "no thanks, as that's not what this thread is about" even though I did engage you about that (see 90% and Star Wars posts).
You said "Let's take every side into account" and we said "you're coming off as sexist yourself."
My post is dripping with condescension for a reason. That you find it disheartening is what I'm hoping for. I want you to lose heart in trying to reframe this as a literary criticism issue, and maybe acknowledge that your approach and use of language comes off as sexist.
If you want to start another thread about literary criticism of video games, go ahead! The discussion there probably won't keep coming back to the same issue over and over again. Discuss all the tropes you want from any point of view. But in this thread, full of feminists who are trying to raise the consciousness of people exactly like you, you're probably not going to have much luck.
Again, it's BECAUSE you want to discuss this topic using phrases like "Also noticed your use of the words 'her' and 'she'" and think you're catching us out for being sexist, that's why you're failing.
Still, I hope that she continues to improve.
The UK television advert only has male actors in it. (It is a live action advert.)
I am glad that Thomas Was Alone was mentioned - that game made me cry both times I played it and it is amazing how much personification can be put into simple jumping quadrangles...I think I will play it again tomorrow.
The thing that I really noticed is that all of the examples in this video are AAA garbage non-games.
Even real games still have sexist tropes, but this one only exists in this one category, albeit an immensely popular category. But even so, these games are more popular on consoles than on PCs and more popular in the US than other countries.
And yeah, AAA games are filled with this crap, and it sucks.
That wasn't helped by the absurdly self indulgent "Captain Mike Across America" - which was about students in 2003-4 before Bush's re-election, but came out in 2008 after Bush had left office, so it wasn't very popular as it was about as topical as a Vote Al Gore badge, as well as basically being ground he'd covered before, so a lot of people felt like it was a rehash. It got mostly ignored, but was released for free on the internet, where it still wasn't really that popular. "Capitalisim: A love story" in 2009 then failed to make back it's budget by a couple of million even including international money.
He's done one thing other than write insipid blogs and "open letters" on his website since, which was his autobiography - which was panned by critics as being disjointed, stuffed with filler, self-aggrandizing, and in some cases, quite heavily embroidered or embellished. Which is kinda suitable, when you think about it.
She makes several good points, but I do wish more coverage of other genres other than all the crime, sandbox games. The violent scenes in God of War 3 and No More Heroes 2 were good examples, but I'm curious to if she would point out games that try to be progressively female or feminist and failed at doing so.
But what I'm wondering is this. Has there ever been an instance where a stranger sent threats over the internet and actually tried to carry them out? My feeling is the people sending these threats are sad lonely people who are too afraid to leave the house and talk to someone, let alone do anything violent. Much like terrorists and people who send bomb threats, they win as soon as you are afraid.
Personally I wish I had threats and hate mail. It would be a signal that I have an audience and my message is making a difference. If someone ever actually tries to come at me, bring it on. It's much more likely to end positively in my favor.
However, I think the real issue isn't that if you get one message from one person, then that person will come over and try to harm you. I think the real fear is that if many, many, many people are sending threats, and the proposed violence is increasing, then it's a good sign that someone else, who hasn't sent a message, is more likely to turn up.
Also if, until now, there haven't been any threats delivered directly to a home address, and then some start arriving, that's another good sign that your home address is now out and about on the shady side of the internet, and that the likelihood of a physical attack has increased.
By being rendered ash In the fires of hatred she's become a greek goddess of half truths about video games.
For example, I stumbled upon one of her twitter posts where she had a screenshot of a threatening email she had received. This email was talking about how someone had made a youtube video contesting her conclusions about the game Hitman. However, instead of politely asking her to respond to said video, the email threatened her with bodily harm for "saying lies about video games."
Even if you are correct that she is somehow lying about games like Hitman, threatening her with bodily harm is not the way to go about calling her out on them.
This article has been passed around and its getting to point people are equating these assholes to all gamers, instead of just calling them assholes.
At this point I want to smack people on both sides of this argument.
What she's saying isn't true, is because the Hitman games actively discourage you from killing - or even being seen by, in many situations - innocent civilians. It doesn't even like you killing hostiles that aren't your target. What she's said about it is certainly a lie, and she created footage to back that up where she's performing actions the game very explicitly tells you that you shouldn't do, despite allowing it. Some people are extra offended by this, because there's a ton of examples she could have pulled that are genuinely as she says.
But that doesn't justify any level of threat. It's just talking bollocks to try and add weight to her point, not even worth getting aggressive over. You say something like "You're talking nonsense", you don't threaten to... anything, really, because it's not even worth the time, nor will anyone actually listen to you if you do. These people are fucking lunatics.
Context is everything. In any game your interactions are limited to the amount of inputs you have. The problem isn't just that the majority of these games rely on these sexist tropes, character stereotypes and clichés to motivate the player to progress; it's that there is often no real context for them to do so. By virtue of the limited inputs you're forced as a player to either be exposed to sexism or not play/ interact.
To accept the argument that these tropes are reflections of real world scenarios, you would also have accept that in the real world, same scenario, that the choices and consequences of those choices would also be the same. You might need to take a red pill if you think these games are realistic in their context.
If these scenes were more realistic, there would be more options available to the player, and maybe that might justify their use. However, like Anita points out (paraphrasing) they only exist because it's a cheap and lazy game way for game designers to motivate and stimulate the player.
For me personally, I've always recognised this in these types of games and not just thought it as stupid but mostly boring.
If environment interaction is key to the fun of the game I want more interactivity. I want to see more diversity in the consequences to as many minute decisions as possible. Not the repetition of the same decision. Repetition is only good for practice (conditioning). Which is mechanism design best suited for other things than killing prostitutes for example.
The repetition of these tropes across all industries is the core problem, because they reinforce the ideas that devalue and misrepresent the female gender.
The other point Anita makes, is the lack of interaction all together. That female characters are literally just sex objects. You cannot interact with them at all. You can argue that there's a lot that you can't interact with, but the focus of the argument is on the sexist kinds.
Context, strip club..
Argument, see! Naked female characters are where they would be in the real world.
Counter, this isn't the only context in which women are naked. These games rely on the stripclub scene as an excuse to have nude/ semi-nude characters in the game, to sex up and stimulate the player. To be inclusive of other context in which female characters are naked in a non-sexualised manner is unseen, because...(insert game designer reasons).
So why does context matter? For many reasons, including:
making comparisons
observing the effects
judging the value of decisions
@Chruba Women as Background Decoration: Part 1 - Tropes vs Women in Video Games @21:41
Hitman: Absolution, take note of the points. What is the purpose and the value of those points with respect to the specific actions: within context of the game and then as a criticism of the game mechanic?
The argument isn't just that you can do that in the game, whether the player is encouraged or not. There are no mechanisms in the game to do anything else with those characters. There's no equal portrayal of women in the game as is with men. The exposure and interaction with female characters are reduced to the tropes mentioned in Anita's videos. If you're oblivious to these facts, then you need to look closer, even if you don't agree that it's a problem.
The short
These video games (despite what fun parts there are): they lack nuance, they're sexist and mostly boring. Recognise it.
TL;DR She has a point but she's been intellectually dishonest at times/exaggerated claims. Pretty much. I love GTA5, but its kinda sexist. Its not sexist just because there is a strip club or ditsy/stupid/annoying female characters. Its sexist because they seem to be the only examples.
I acknowledge that makes me cis white pig scum to which I ask that you look at all the fucks I give about that.
As for your point about research, I agree that it's lacking a bit. But the sheer number of games she covers with relative accuracy shows that she did buy and play a crapton of games. In order to get these out faster, she likely mostly is relying on the games themselves to prove her points. And they do, at the end of the day. A huge number of the most popular games that have come out for the last two or three decades have some kind of sexist portrayal of women in them. She just sorta points that out directly to all the people who will respond to a statement about sexism with "Where's your proof that games are sexist? I can show you all these games that aren't, so you can't prove anything!" She just uses overwhelming evidence from various games to make her point.
Is this the best video content? Not for anyone who's educated or has read TVTropes. But it's not targeted at us. It's targeted at the people who already really disagree with her and will fight her on her argument. The rest of us looking for something meaningful can look elsewhere. Her work is meant to be a very basic overview of sexist tropes that are used in games. I hope in a few years when she finishes this series, we can get some more detailed analyses where she can show the researching skills she hopefully got in grad school.
I wondered about this myself but I'm not sure of how she has dealt with the responses to her videos. She certainly seems to have received more media attention.
Regardless if FNPL can go fortnightly, anyone can.