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[Brawndo Addict]

It's not like I joined Gaf just to talk about Sarkeesian. I've been here, posting regularly, for months. I find these debates to be pretty interesting and so I enjoy participating in them. I'm glad a place like this exists where people can have civil discussions about issues of gender in gaming. My bad?

I find it incredibly disingenuous of you to act as if your free time is a precious commodity when you spent the last week focusing almost entirely on these subjects while suggesting that others who spend their time doing so are somehow obsessive. You say you find the debates interesting but have never sought out other kinds of resources like the kind Lime has meticulously detailed for you. Instead you've spent who knows how many hours being angry about Anita not meeting your content standards but you refuse to even look for or engage with those content creators that do, and then act as if the failure of those sources to attract your attention is their fault, and not your own.

 

[Imru’ al-Qays]

I think the bolded part is what's been bothering me. Such dismissiveness over something that's actually bringing good progress and valuable perspective into the gaming culture and industry.

It just makes me doubt the sincerity of her detractors, whom are saying they are supporters of her cause, whilst all the while, and in very persistent and loud volumes, dismissing her work outright and branding them counter-productive.

For me the value of a work like Sarkeesian's does not inhere in its ideological correctness (though what little value I assign her videos is, I think, largely because I agree with her overall thesis: I couldn't even name you anyone who doesn't because I don't really think they're worth engaging with). I don't think it's my responsibility to treat her videos as being better than they are simply because I agree that gaming should be more diverse.

I don't want to see better game criticism because it'll be good for my side in some argument, though I do think it would be. I want to see better game criticism because I think good criticism is something to be valued in itself.

I find it incredibly disingenuous of you to act as if your free time is a precious commodity when you spent the last week focusing almost entirely on these subjects while suggesting that others who spend their time doing so are somehow obsessive. You say you find the debates interesting but have never sought out other kinds of resources like the kind Lime has meticulously detailed for you. Instead you've spent who knows how many hours being angry about Anita not meeting your content standards but you refuse to even look for or engage with those content creators that do, and then act as if the failure of those sources to attract your attention is their fault, and not your own.

I think you misunderstand the argument I was making. I don't think games academics are in any way failing by not attracting my attention. I don't expect anyone outside of the academy to read any of my work either. That's not what they set out to do, and it's not what they should set out to do (though when the occasional academic does come along who can talk to a lay audience just as well as to an academic audience that's always great). But if we want to raise the level of the discourse among lay gamers, and I count myself among them, we're going to need someone to come and bridge the gap. Sarkeesian could do it, I think: she seems perfectly intelligent. But so far that's not what she's doing. And I find that a bit disappointing.

To use an analogy: why is a guy like Ezra Klein so important? Because he's methodologically rigorous and accessible simultaneously. I'm not a student of political science, but I don't need to be to have a firm grasp of public policy issues precisely because people like Ezra Klein and Matt Yglesias do such a good job of synthesizing them for my non-specialist consumption. They're smart enough to be informative, but accessible enough to be useful. If you've got smart people being inaccessible that's academics, and if you've got accessible people being dumb (or making dumb arguments) you've got polemicists like, say, Rush Limbaugh or whoever the left-wing equivalent of Rush Limbaugh is (the only left-wing pundits I know of off the top of my head are the likes of Melissa Harris-Perry and Chris Hayes, both of whom I think it's unfair to compare to Rush).

 

[frequency]

I guess whether you think her videos are counterproductive will depend on the extent to which you think people take issue with them for valid reasons as opposed to rank sexism. I think there's a loud minority of rank sexists amidst a significant population of people who aren't convinced by her arguments simply because they're often not very good arguments. My first instinct upon watching her video was: "she's misusing Dragon Age." A lot of people have come along and said that they found her treatments of other games, including Bioshock and Red Dead, to be similarly problematic. This causes them to largely dismiss her project, as I have done, but perhaps also to become predisposed to dismiss future projects in a similar vein, which I like to think I have not done.

Of course, if you think that most of the Sarkeesian-skeptics are simply not likely to be convinced by anyone then I could see why my stance wouldn't make sense.

I think anyone can change. I think this series is a fine starting point and I am seeing the promise of positive change. This series has literally given me hope for a better gaming future.

Will everyone immediately change their mind from these videos? No. There will be people who are against them. There are people against everything. But what matters to me is that it's planting the seed for change.

Developers are watching and even publicly backing the idea of gender equality. They will be actively aware for their next games. And the idea of equality will spread as the number of games promoting such ideas increase.

Why do we accept the bald space marine or whatever as the standard? Because the game creators made it so. I believe the Tim Shafers and the Neil Druckmanns of the world have the power to evoke change.

I am hopeful that the future will bring us more characters like Ellie and gamers will come around and realize that this movement isn't about taking away the things they love - even if for now they stubbornly dismiss her project for whatever reason.

To me, there is nothing counterproductive about this series. What would be counterproductive is being quiet and not saying or doing anything for fear of failing some lofty academic standards being placed on a YouTube series by random detractors on forums.

 

[Imru’ al-Qays]

I think anyone can change. I think this series is a fine starting point and I am seeing the promise of positive change. This series has literally given me hope for a better gaming future.

Will everyone immediately change their mind from these videos? No. There will be people who are against them. There are people against everything. But what matters to me is that it's planting the seed for change.

Developers are watching and even publicly backing the idea of gender equality. They will be actively aware for their next games. And the idea of equality will spread as the number of games promoting such ideas increase.

Why do we accept the bald space marine or whatever as the standard? Because the game creators made it so. I believe the Tim Shafers and the Neil Druckmanns of the world have the power to evoke change.

I am hopeful that the future will bring us more characters like Ellie and gamers will come around and realize that this movement isn't about taking away the things they love - even if for now they stubbornly dismiss her project for whatever reason.

To me, there is nothing counterproductive about this series. What would be counterproductive is being quiet and not saying or doing anything for fear of failing some lofty academic standards being placed on a YouTube series by random detractors on forums.

I can absolutely sympathize with that viewpoint. And maybe calling her videos counterproductive is a hasty judgment. I spend most of my time reading debates between Arabists where sloppy sourcework is just about the worst thing imaginable, that probably colors my approach to Sarkeesian's videos.

 

[Brawndo Addict]

I think you misunderstand the argument I was making. I don't think games academics are in any way failing by not attracting my attention. I don't expect anyone outside of the academy to read any of my work either. That's not what they set out to do, and it's not what they should set out to do (though when the occasional academic does come along who can talk to a lay audience just as well as to an academic audience that's always great). But if we want to raise the level of the discourse among lay gamers, and I count myself among them, we're going to need someone to come and bridge the gap. Sarkeesian could do it, I think: she seems perfectly intelligent. But so far that's not what she's doing. And I find that a bit disappointing.

Well, if you want to avoid academic articles because of their inaccessibility or lack of time, I would suggest incredibly insightful authors like

• Mattie Brice
• Maddy Myers
• Kris Ligman
• Todd Harper
• Jenn Frank
• Liz Ryerson
• Zoya Street
• Cara Ellison
• Brianna Wu
• Celia Pearce
• Tracy Fullerton
• Samantha Allen
• Merritt Kopas
• Lana Polansky
• Kaitlin Tremblay
• Katherine Cross
• Sarah Wanencheck

This doesn't mean they should only be read because of their perspectives on gender and sexuality and identity (i.e. exocitization). They also write and make some great articles/games on all sorts of topics within video games that are worth reading. And some of them have difficulty getting positions in the industry, because of harassment and nepotism, so they could definitely also receive some money for their efforts and hard work.

Hell, if you think this is insurmountable to follow all these listed authors, simply check Critical Distance each week. They always provide great round-ups and collections around the web of video game related articles that ranges in academic and non-academic quality. Unfortunately CD is being harassed and attacked by gamers because of all this at the moment, so I am not sure how long the years-old site will continue.

Imru’ al-Qays, I just gave you a buttload of resources and you don't even comment on it? And you're the poster who was talking about "epistemically closed" a couple of posts above?

You can even just google the academic authors of the listed articles to read their publicly disseminated work to find your unicorn of the bridge between esoteric academia and exoteric mainstream research. It's really that easy.

Absolutely. I agree with the fundamental critique that depictions of women in games could stand to improve. But take a look at romance novels (and Twilight and Fifty Shades are just the most mainstream edge of this predominantly female genre): as a whole this sort of fiction is just as problematic as anything that shows up in gaming, and yet the feminist critique doesn't seem to have much traction at all. At least from the outside, maybe Twilight fans really do agonize over what feminists think about their favorite books and I just don't know about it.

Of course you won't be familiar with it because it's not a community you involve yourself with to the degree you do with gaming. But anyone can Google "Feminism romance novels criticism" or any similar objection and see there's plenty of substance there too.

You can't take your own ignorance and then use that as evidence of absence. If you were saying you wish the authors or works Lime posted would have as much visibility as Sarkeesian that would be very different from saying that Sarkeesian is poisoning the well by being the only person talking about this in an accessible way.

 

[Imru’ al-Qays]

You can't take your own ignorance and then use that as evidence of absence. If you were saying you wish the authors or works Lime posted would have as much visibility as Sarkeesian that would be very different from saying that Sarkeesian is poisoning the well by being the only person talking about this in an accessible way.

Well, the reason these authors don't have as much visibility as Sarkeesian is that they're not YouTube videos. If they were YouTube videos I'd probably be watching them right now. That's what I mean by accessibility and why it's important.

Also, my point about Twilight/50 Shades wasn't that it didn't have feminist critics, it was that those feminist critics didn't seem to have much traction within those works' fanbases, whereas Sarkeesian seems to have a ton of traction within the gaming fanbase. You can disagree with that line of argumentation, and I'm certainly no expert on what Twilight fans think about their feminist critics, but please don't misrepresent it.

Imru’ al-Qays, I just gave you a buttload of resources and you don't even comment on it? And you're the poster who was talking about "epistemically closed" a couple of posts above?

Shit, you can even just google the academic authors of the listed articles to read their publicly disseminated work to find your unicorn of the bridge between esoteric academia and exoteric mainstream research. It's really that easy.

uh huh

(The fact that academic works are often locked away from the general public is only one reason why they're inaccessible to laypeople, and it's not the principle reason they're inaccessible to me, since I have access to a university library.)

 

[JMargaris]

Critical Distance is pretty bad and ironically it's impossible to be critical of the content there as almost any criticism is dismissed as harassment and they proudly don't engage with criticism.

Hmmm...let me put that a different way. I'm not sure that Critical Distance is bad so much as it has fallen into the trap of being 95% "cultural criticism" that is so far removed from games that there's no audience for it.

http://www.rogerebert.com/mzs/please-critics-write-about-the-filmmaking

Movies and television are visual art forms, and aural art forms. They are not just about plot, characterization and theme. Analytical writing about movies and TV should incorporate some discussion of the means by which the plot is advanced, the characters developed, the themes explored. It should devote some space, some small bit of the word count, to the compositions, the cutting, the music, the decor, the lighting, the overall rhythm and mood of the piece.

Otherwise it's all just book reports or political op-eds that happen to be about film and TV. It's literary criticism about visual media. It's only achieving half of its potential, if that. And it's doing nothing to help a viewer understand how a work evokes particular feelings in them as they watch it.
...
I refuse to accept the argument that if your writing focuses on, say, issues of politics—race, class, gender, representation in general—then there's no urgent need to comment directly on form.

That's an evasion of the film and TV critic's duty, and an excuse for not doing something because it's just a little bit harder than whatever you're used to.

Form is the means by which content is expressed. Don't shortchange it for reasons of personal convenience.

This is a good read. The argument in the above is that few film critics engage with the form of the movie they are critiquing. A lot of video game criticism has gone one step beyond that. It doesn't engage with the form at all, and often not with the content at all either. It's not even cultural criticism through the lens of gaming (whatever that might mean) - a lot of the time it's just generic cultural criticism that might as well be on Salon.com, with one or two sentences to weakly tie it to games. This is not "video game criticism" or even "video game culture criticism."

A critical site or collection of authors can't survive when they become so far removed from the base material. The most recent post in Critical Distance, itself linking to a dozen+ other posts, has essentially nothing about the form of video games. The Nier post looks promising, but most of the pieces it links don't talk about form at all, or handle it brief summary phrased similarly to a review.

"Lana Polansky pens a reminder that harassers are not entitled to a place in the conversation..."

This has almost nothing to do with video games. It is video game related only in that some people who get harassed write about video games. It's fine to bring this up as a "very special episode", but this sort of stuff is the bulk of the content. It's the actual video game criticism that is the very special episode.

It's like a film critic writing 99 pieces about how Woody Allen is a perv and 1 piece about his movies. That person isn't a film critic - they are a Woody Allen / Hollywood critic. Chastising Woody Allen isn't film criticism.
---

And these writers have problems finding steady employ? Of course they do. They don't get hired at places like Salon because their range is too narrow (and Salon only needs zero or one people who write about games) and they don't get hired at gamer outlets because the range is too broad and too disconnected from video games.

Despite the proclamations that gamers are dead it's gamers who read this stuff. Soccer moms and multiracial tween girls into Flappy Bird and Kim Kardashian aren't checking out Critical Distance. The site is for the people most into video games. Bu then you go to the site and see that's it's barely related to video games at all.

These writers have problems finding jobs because the market for their work is very small. That's not anyone's fault and that's not discrimination. I mean, maybe discrimination is a factor, but not having an audience is obviously a huge factor as well. They are peddling a product very few people are interested in. There are very few "cultural critics" of any stripe on staff at gaming sites.

I don't think I've ever seen Samantha Allen write about the form of a video game. (I admit I have not searched exhaustively) She's best known for writing about a game she didn't even play. (TL)

I'm not going to say that kind of writing is bad. But that kind of writing appeals to few people. Most websites aren't going to hire someone to serve as a full-time scold.

Edit: Reminder: I have nothing against Anita's videos, this is a comment on the topic of CD and cultural criticism. Anita's videos are all about content and at least somewhat about form - they aren't cultural criticism in the same way that CD typically is. Her videos are directly connected to the source material.

 

[YesNOnoNOYes]

For me the value of a work like Sarkeesian's does not inhere in its ideological correctness (though what little value I assign her videos is, I think, largely because I agree with her overall thesis: I couldn't even name you anyone who doesn't because I don't really think they're worth engaging with). I don't think it's my responsibility to treat her videos as being better than they are simply because I agree that gaming should be more diverse.

I don't want to see better game criticism because it'll be good for my side in some argument, though I do think it would be. I want to see better game criticism because I think good criticism is something to be valued in itself.

It's nice for some people that sexism and issues that affect women and women gamers are purely academic or idealised discussion points. Of course good criticism is something of value in itself.

And no, it is not your responsibility to treat her videos being better than they are because you agree that gaming should be more diverse.

But your posts here sure seems to detract from the very notion that gaming should be more diverse through reinforced statements that it is more important to be harsh on her methodology than to highlight the good she's bringing.

Like I say, I simply can't quite believe the sincerity that you are actually a supporter of her issues, in terms of the problematic mechanism of women and women's figures representation in the gaming industry.

I'm a woman gamer. I recognise her videos are far from perfect but hell, she's really doing a lot of good and she's really brave for doing it, so I will choose not to tear into her flawed vehicle.

Others make a different call. Ultimately, everyone's decisions reflect on themselves, right?

 

[Brawndo Addict]

Well, the reason these authors don't have as much visibility as Sarkeesian is that they're not YouTube videos. If they were YouTube videos I'd probably be watching them right now. That's what I mean by accessibility and why it's important.

Also, my point about Twilight/50 Shades wasn't that it didn't have feminist critics, it was that those feminist critics didn't seem to have much traction within those works' fanbases, whereas Sarkeesian seems to have a ton of traction within the gaming fanbase. You can disagree with that line of argumentation, and I'm certainly no expert on what Twilight fans think about their feminist critics, but please don't misrepresent it.

The former I think is an unfair demand and incorrectly assumes that Anita's 'popularity' in the gaming community is because of positive and not negative reasons. Defining accessibility as audio versus text is not a meaningful complaint and it assumes that even if they were YouTube videos that they would automatically have visibility or that even without visibility you and others would proactively seek them out. Considering that the textual versions are not mainstream, I don't think it's a stretch to say that a video version would not be either. It also rings hollow considering we're all typing in a forum so it's not like needing time to read text is the problem here.

The latter is again a disingenuous comparison because you're comparing a particular fanbase of a particular book in a particular genre of a particular medium to fans of the medium of gaming in total. A fair comparison would be to evaluate how fans of books feel about it, same as fans of games feel. Or to see how fans of Call of Duty: Ghosts feel about Anita's videos or the general critique behind it.

 

[Imru’ al-Qays]

The former I think is an unfair demand and incorrectly assumes that Anita's 'popularity' in the gaming community is because of positive and not negative reasons. Defining accessibility as audio versus text is not a meaningful complaint and it assumes that even if they were YouTube videos that they would automatically have visibility or that even without visibility you and others would proactively seek them out. Considering that the textual versions are not mainstream, I don't think it's a stretch to say that a video version would not be either. It also rings hollow considering we're all typing in a forum so it's not like needing time to read text is the problem here.

Having a written discussion with someone is very, very different from reading a book. And I think it's pretty clear that the YouTube format is one of the reasons for Sarkeesian's explosion in popularity: she wasn't anywhere near this visible or influential back when she was just a text blogger. Videos are accessible.

The latter is again a disingenuous comparison because you're comparing a particular fanbase of a particular book in a particular genre of a particular medium to fans of the medium of gaming in total. A fair comparison would be to evaluate how fans of books feel about it, same as fans of games feel. Or to see how fans of Call of Duty: Ghosts feel about Anita's videos or the general critique behind it.

I'm not sure this is true. Gaming is a much smaller space than literature in terms of internal variety. The AAA "genre" absolutely dominates gaming in a way that no single genre dominates literature, and in terms of the demographic diversity of its fanbase it is, I think, quite assimilable to a single literary genre. This is why almost all of Anita's examples are from AAA games. I think comparing gaming as a whole to, say, the romance genre (which was my intent when I mentioned Twilight and 50 Shades), or to scifi/fantasy, is perfectly valid.

 

[zeldablue]

How exactly would you like to see someone held accountable for their actions online? The death of anonymity?

Broken window theory?

If a neighborhood is nice, people won't want to break anything. But if a neighborhood has ONE broken window...suddenly more people think it's okay to litter and break more windows.

The environment needs to foster a cleaner reputation. The internet is filled with broken windows, to say the least. Calling out and flagging harassment would do wonders. Set the example and people will follow.

Also most people come online with some internalized feelings. It's rather therapeutic to yell at someone you'll never see in real life.

I think those two factors cause the terrible abuse.

 

[ab.aeterno]

And again, this is where my context argument comes in, as although RDR features some women that some may find negative, it also features representation of women that some may find positive. It's well aware it's doing both so to speak.

Hold on, representation is not a two-sided scale where "good" representation excuses or makes up for the bad. That's a thoroughly ridiculous argument, and being aware that you're doing it is meaningless unless there's a point to it or a point being made; it certainly doesn't make it automatically OK.

I mean, if I make a game and have a character that is like the typical racist caricature of blacks from back in the day, from visual presentation to stereotypical speech and mannerisms, that's not suddenly OK if I also include a black character that isn't that. It's still fucking terrible. And why the fuck would she bring it up when she is trying to point out examples to support her argument? Do you write thesis papers in which you contradict yourself, or do you focus on proving your point? I'm not sure how many times I'm going to have to point that out.

Edit: look, this isn't the first time I've seen this argument of "but there's some good/not terrible women characters in this game too!" argument come up, and maybe you weren't intending to imply that, but that's certainly how it reads to me.

You know, that lack of interest in fields such as computer science and programming might explain a large portion of the industry's gender disparity?

Are you in a STEM field? Because I am, and it's sometimes a real boys club. It's not like it's overt sexism or misogyny, but it's the things people say or do that make it clear they consider it a men's field, or don't especially make women feel welcome.

Writing it off as a lack of interest is not only dishonest, since it's lacking any foundation, it's also impossible to prove and shuts down any conversation on the subject because it's a like a tautology. Instead of declaring a symptom the cause, isn't it better to examine why women might not feel interested in it, and whether that's caused by gender roles and social constructs that push them away from considering it?

 

[Imru’ al-Qays]

But your posts here sure seems to detract from the very notion that gaming should be more diverse through reinforced statements that it is more important to be harsh on her methodology than to highlight the good she's bringing.

Like I say, I simply can't quite believe the sincerity that you are actually a supporter of her issues, in terms of the problematic mechanism of women and women's figures representation in the gaming industry.

I mean, I'm on record at Gaf lamenting that Assassin's Creed doesn't have a female protagonist option. I was piled on by a bunch of AC fans who insisted that it would be absolutely impossible to include a female lead. I'm sure I've made similar arguments for other game. I don't see any reason to doubt my sincerity when it comes to the issue of representing women in games more positively.

 

[YesNOnoNOYes]

I mean, I'm on record at Gaf lamenting that Assassin's Creed doesn't have a female protagonist option. I was piled on by a bunch of AC fans who insisted that it would be absolutely impossible to include a female lead. I'm sure I've made similar arguments for other game. I don't see any reason to doubt my sincerity when it comes to the issue of representing women in games more positively.

Im not familiar with all of your posts and stances. I dont really go through other people's post history. I usually go by the poster's contributions in the active thread.

So, my perspective is garnered from to your lines of argument in this particular topic.

 

[Imru’ al-Qays]

And why the fuck would she bring it up when she is trying to point out examples to support her argument? Do you write thesis papers in which you contradict yourself, or do you focus on proving your point? I'm not sure how many times I'm going to have to point that out.

Do you not anticipate and address potential counterexamples or counterarguments when writing a paper? Really? I sure as hell do: if I don't I'll be laughed out of wherever it is I'm presenting my paper.

When one of my students writes a paper that completely ignores plausible criticisms of their main thesis that's intellectual dishonesty or laziness, not something to be lauded.

Im not familiar with all of your posts and stances. I dont really go through other people's post history. I usually go by the poster's contributions in the active thread.

So, my perspective is garnered from to your lines of argument in this particular topic.

Yes, but I don't see why criticizing Sarkeesian should ever imply that someone is somehow opposed to more diversity in games. I think that's an unfair assumption to make.

 

[-Cwalat-]

My arguments only go towards this video and not her feminist move or any other video.

The notion that only evil people in videogames are subjected to commit these crimes towards women, and that in the real world it is "normal men" as she put it, i take offense to. There is no urge within "normal men" to commit these sexual violations towards women in the real world. There is something morally and ethically wrong with people who commit these crimes, not something that you can just put a label on and say it's normal men.

It is not normal people who commit these crimes.

Yes, there is a point to her arguments and i approve of the video, mostly towards the end and her brilliant comparison to "Papa & Yo", but some of the arguments i take offense to and the lack of context within her arguments is mind blowing.

I largely agree with her. For example, in God of War 3, i was really distraught when i had no other choice but to use the hand cuffed girl and kill her in order to continue the level, i mean she was innocent. But in fairness to the developers... that is there story they want to tell about this character Kratos and his journey for revenge. In the game Kratos did numerous atrocities to innocent men as well, but she failed to point that out in her video.

I don't like how she is putting it in the viewers face without any context to the games stories. Assassins Creed 2 is partially based on actual events of from that epoch.

Also, she doesn't once mention other games that have stron stories with strong female characters like Lara Croft, Nariko, Sheva, Jill Valentine, Claire Redfield and many more. So this becomes more like an objectification in of itself to, wrongly so, showcase the gaming industry as being the opposite of her feminist arguments, which is not the case at all.

 

[ab.aeterno]

Do you not anticipate and address potential counterexamples or counterarguments when writing a paper? Really? I sure as hell do: if I don't I'll be laughed out of wherever it is I'm presenting my paper.

When one of my students writes a paper that completely ignores plausible criticisms of their main thesis that's intellectual dishonesty or laziness, not something to be lauded.

Well, I mean, no shit. I brought that up in a past post in this very topic. The problem is that when people talk about how she's cherry-picking examples or not presenting the "other side," our variations in that same argument, they're not asking for her to thoughtfully address counterarguments. They just don't want her to argue what she's arguing. They want her to weaken her premise and not make any real point by presenting both "sides" without an "agenda" or "bias," which is also known as a thesis.

It also goes back to my other point in that post: OK, so there's a good representation of a woman along with a bad one that exists in a larger pattern. So fucking what? It doesn't change her point, it doesn't undermine her argument by existing, and it doesn't make the bad thing OK.

 

[Corpekata]

My arguments only go towards this video and not her feminist move or any other video.

The notion that only evil people in videogames are subjected to commit these crimes towards women, and that in the real world it is "normal men" as she put it, i take offense to. There is no urge within "normal men" to commit these sexual violations towards women in the real world. There is something morally and ethically wrong with people who commit these crimes, not something that you can just put a label on and say it's normal men.

It is not normal people who commit these crimes.

This isn't really what she's saying. She's saying that most people that do commit these crimes are benign. Seemingly normal people like an office mate or the cashier that checks out your groceries. Not mustache twirling villains like it portrayed most of the time.

 

[JMargaris]

I really don't understand this conversation.

Could her videos be different? Yes. Could they be better? Yes. Could someone else do better? Maybe. Are they therefore bad or counter-productive? No.

You don't need to say that her videos could be better 50 thousand times in a row. Yes, they could be better. Point made.

 

[Imru’ al-Qays]

Well, I mean, no shit. I brought that up in a past post in this very topic. The problem is that when people talk about how she's cherry-picking examples or not presenting the "other side," our variations in that same argument, they're not asking for her to thoughtfully address counterarguments. They just don't want her to argue what she's arguing. They want her to weaken her premise and not make any real point by presenting both "sides" without an "agenda" or "bias," which is also known as a thesis.

It also goes back to my other point in that post: OK, so there's a good representation of a woman along with a bad one that exists in a larger pattern. So fucking what? It doesn't change her point, it doesn't undermine her argument by existing, and it doesn't make the bad thing OK.

I think this is a bit uncharitable. My issue with her showing six seconds of objectionable trope from a game and then moving on to the next example is that she doesn't attempt to evaluate the games holistically. No, having a single good female character doesn't automatically absolve a game for having a bad female character. But I don't think isolating a single mechanic or scene from Bioshock or Red Dead tells me anything about whether those works are part of the problem or part of the solution. I've played Red Dead and I know that she's giving the game short shrift, but I've never played Bioshock and so I can only speculate, precisely because I don't trust her to present me that game's treatment of women as a coherent whole, rather than as a distorted and misleading collection of dialog snippets.

No analysis of Shakespeare's treatment of Jews is going to just mention a couple of lines of dialog from The Merchant of Venice and leave it at that. No analysis of "the Jew in early modern European literature" is going to content itself with a slipshod, decontextualized reading of a few lines of Shakespeare just to support its thesis. Shakespeare scholars would be outraged, and rightly so. I really object to this sort of analysis on principle, and it frustrates me that so many people are willing to give it a pass just because they agree with its conclusions.

I really don't understand this conversation.

Could her videos be different? Yes. Could they be better? Yes. Could someone else do better? Maybe. Are they therefore bad or counter-productive? No.

You don't need to say that her videos could be better 50 thousand times in a row. Yes, they could be better. Point made.

Fair enough. I suppose it's time for me to retire from the argument.

 

[The Blue Jihad]

Bolded part: I wish I can see this to gain traction. Who's managing it? Is there somewhere I can contribute support for it? Has there been any further discussions since? Because I genuinely hope it's not just some sentiment that will fizzle out in the foreseeable future.

Yo. Yes, it's happening. I've spent the past couple of days plotting it out, pinging a few GAFfers for writing/contributing, identifying our initial batch of games to discuss, etc. I've got at least six definite titles with a few solid theses running under them. It's taking time, but we're going to do it right. A few ideas are bouncing around about Remember Me, too. My hunch is that there's something to explore there in the areas of gender roles, predatory behaviors, reversal of genre expectation, and a very healthy thematic pull from classic French/Italian cinema and some ideas from the Philip K. Dick sci-fi neighborhood.

Been playing through Saint's Row IV and there's a lot in there to unpack...surprisingly. It isn't hyperbole when you see people talking about how fair it is for many things. It'd be a longer form analysis, but you can expect to see shots fired across the Rockstar bow. SRIV has a lot of great stuff going on underneath that crazy, glitzy, leather-clad "let's play dress-up" veneer. It's--to borrow a trope--Dangerously Genre-Savvy and we're going to explain how it does what it does, and what Volition has done with the franchise.

There's a lot going on for this web series and when we do launch, it's going to have a significant impact.



Plus I'm in the middle of potential job and house moves; it's kind of ridiculous how much those are taking from my discretionary time. Heh

 

[YesNOnoNOYes]

Yes, but I don't see why criticizing Sarkeesian should ever imply that someone is somehow opposed to more diversity in games. I think that's an unfair assumption to make.

Like has been mentioned, it is the fervour and frequency of detraction with which you have committed to that raised my doubt.

Not sure about unfair. It just what comes across to me.

 

[YesNOnoNOYes]

Yo. Yes, it's happening. I've spent the past couple of days plotting it out, pinging a few GAFfers for writing/contributing, identifying our initial batch of games to discuss, etc. I've got at least six definite titles with a few solid theses running under them. It's taking time, but we're going to do it right. A few ideas are bouncing around about Remember Me, too. My hunch is that there's something to explore there in the areas of gender roles, predatory behaviors, reversal of genre expectation, and a very healthy thematic pull from classic French/Italian cinema and some ideas from the Philip K. Dick sci-fi neighborhood.

Been playing through Saint's Row IV and there's a lot in there to unpack...surprisingly. It isn't hyperbole when you see people talking about how fair it is for many things. It'd be a longer form analysis, but you can expect to see shots fired across the Rockstar bow. SRIV has a lot of great stuff going on underneath that crazy, glitzy, leather-clad "let's play dress-up" veneer. It's--to borrow a trope--Dangerously Genre-Savvy and we're going to explain how it does what it does, and what Volition has done with the franchise.

There's a lot going on for this web series and when we do launch, it's going to have a significant impact.



Plus I'm in the middle of potential job and house moves; it's kind of ridiculous how much those are taking from my discretionary time. Heh

Cool Hope you keep at it

Let me know when theres a proprer channel to support it monetarily !

GL with job and house moves, those things always take a bit of time, to put it mildly

 

[ChawlieTheFair]

Hold on, representation is not a two-sided scale where "good" representation excuses or makes up for the bad. That's a thoroughly ridiculous argument, and being aware that you're doing it is meaningless unless there's a point to it or a point being made; it certainly doesn't make it automatically OK.

I mean, if I make a game and have a character that is like the typical racist caricature of blacks from back in the day, from visual presentation to stereotypical speech and mannerisms, that's not suddenly OK if I also include a black character that isn't that. It's still fucking terrible. And why the fuck would she bring it up when she is trying to point out examples to support her argument? Do you write thesis papers in which you contradict yourself, or do you focus on proving your point? I'm not sure how many times I'm going to have to point that out.

Edit: look, this isn't the first time I've seen this argument of "but there's some good/not terrible women characters in this game too!" argument come up, and maybe you weren't intending to imply that, but that's certainly how it reads to me.


Are you in a STEM field? Because I am, and it's sometimes a real boys club. It's not like it's overt sexism or misogyny, but it's the things people say or do that make it clear they consider it a men's field, or don't especially make women feel welcome.

Writing it off as a lack of interest is not only dishonest, since it's lacking any foundation, it's also impossible to prove and shuts down any conversation on the subject because it's a like a tautology. Instead of declaring a symptom the cause, isn't it better to examine why women might not feel interested in it, and whether that's caused by gender roles and social constructs that push them away from considering it?

You are supposed to do both actually

I don't see how having a spectrum of representation is bad. If the positives are there, the viewer/player will see them and further attribute the negatives as negative. The very point is that there IS a spectrum. If a game features only a negative side of said spectrum, then that's where I believe we have genuine problems.

 

[zeldablue]

She tries to make counter arguments for almost every situation. She talked at Gaymer about how they try to think of every rebuttal when planning out the episodes.

I'm not sure if people really listen to those sections though.

 

[Brawndo Addict]

Having a written discussion with someone is very, very different from reading a book. And I think it's pretty clear that the YouTube format is one of the reasons for Sarkeesian's explosion in popularity: she wasn't anywhere near this visible or influential back when she was just a text blogger. Videos are accessible.

A book is not at all like a text blog or an article. I don't know why you keep making these kinds of misleading comparisons. Reading a written discussion is incredibly similar to reading a blog or articles that may or may not allow comments. In fact, it's much more similar than watching a video.

Feminist Frequency has been a video series since 2009, it's not like her popularity is some new development, it took her time to build up a consistent following in the 100,000s. You'll notice that the only 'explosion' of her popularity occurs after she starts doing the Tropes in video games series. Look at this timeline:

A video about the Oscars, 500,00 views. A video about the hunger games, 280,000 views. Then a video about her kickstarter, 380,000 views. Then her first video about video game tropes, 2,000,000 views. Quadrupled. That is not normal. That explosion is not because of youtube, that's because the gaming community went crazy. Her viewership didn't suddenly explode when she made the kickstarter video, it was only after the gaming community was brought to a frothing frenzy of controversy by the time of her first video release.

I would also hazard a guess that you were not familiar with Anita Sarkeesian prior to her making this series. If that's true, then I'd have to ask why you think you would have been familiar with a theoretical alternative to her who could have had similar visibility. That people who provide the type of analytical content you want in text form rather than video is not a slight against them, it's just a reflection of stubborn refusal to consume the content where it is. You can read an article much faster than you can watch a video, and I don't think you've made a habit of perusing youtube for academically orientated video game commentary either. You said you would watch videos of those types if they existed, but how much time do you actually spend looking for them or watching them? I don't think it's a low probability that the only reason you heard about Anita and her series was through GAF or something similar and not because you found the series independently through habit.

I'm not sure this is true. Gaming is a much smaller space than literature in terms of internal variety. The AAA "genre" absolutely dominates gaming in a way that no single genre dominates literature, and in terms of the demographic diversity of its fanbase it is, I think, quite assimilable to a single literary genre. This is why almost all of Anita's examples are from AAA games. I think comparing gaming as a whole to, say, the romance genre (which was my intent when I mentioned Twilight and 50 Shades), or to scifi/fantasy, is perfectly valid.

First I think you're trying really hard to smooth over significant differences in the AAA space. JRPGs, shooters, fighters, Turn-Based-Strategy, puzzle games, platformers, action adventure, MOBA, etc. The AAA space is still quite diverse and acting as if it is a single genre is wrong. I don't know how you can say the difference between the MOBA scene, fighting game scene, shooter scene, and speed running scene is non-trivial. It is far from being assimilable to single over-arching all-inclusive genre. However I do agree I nitpicked too specifically. A fair comparison would not be COD: Ghosts consumers, but AAA shooter consumers.

Aside from that, I don't see how the existence of those two books, or romance novels in the aggregate, somehow proves that romance novel readers are not aware of or agreeable to feminist critiques of the genre, or that the proportion of those who are is divergent from the corresponding proportion of gamers who think the same. There is plenty of debate about female depictions in SFF and romance novels by both readers and commentators. That these critiques do not seem to you to have fundamentally changed their respective industries does not seem to me any more relevant than saying criticism of male-dominated politics has not resulted in a more equal gender share of elected officials.

So what was the point of bringing this up in the first place? You agree the depiction of females in games is problematic, but for some reason you need to talk about romance novels and how you don't think the same kind of critique is making any significant headway there. So what? If you agree with the critique in the first place I don't see why that fact would need mentioning. Because the implication you're making seems to be that the critique itself is therefore wrong or that it should not be taken into account if the audience doesn't want it. Otherwise, I don't see why you would bring it up because the implicit assumption would be that more work needs to be done if it hasn't had an impact yet (assuming that, as you said, you agree that it should).

 

[Imru’ al-Qays]

So what was the point of bringing this up in the first place? You agree the depiction of females in games is problematic, but for some reason you need to talk about romance novels and how you don't think the same kind of critique is making any significant headway there. So what? If you agree with the critique in the first place I don't see why that fact would need mentioning. Because the implication you're making seems to be that the critique itself is therefore wrong or that it should not be taken into account if the audience doesn't want it. Otherwise, I don't see why you would bring it up because the implicit assumption would be that more work needs to be done if it hasn't had an impact yet (assuming that, as you said, you agree that it should).

To address this rather eisegetical reading of my post: I'm interested by the possibility that being criticized by members of an outgroup is actually more likely to cause reevaluation of a medium's themes than criticism by members of an ingroup. That's sort of counterintuitive to me, since before this whole affair blew up I would have thought that the most effective criticisms of a group's behavior would tend to come from within the group rather than from without.

 

[Brawndo Addict]

To address this rather eisegetical reading of my post: I'm interested by the possibility that being criticized by members of an outgroup is actually more likely to cause reevaluation of a medium's themes than criticism by members of an ingroup. That's sort of counterintuitive to me, since before this whole affair blew up I would have thought that the most effective criticisms of a group's behavior would tend to come from within the group rather than from without.

Where are you getting that idea from? Because it seems to me you are conflating intensity of discussion with actual acceptance of the underlying critique. You can look back up at my post about thread lengths and see that while the gaming community discusses Anita's videos far more intensely than it does others, that in no way suggests the content is actually being positively received or evaluated, on the contrary, I'd argue it shows the opposite. For that you need only to look into the threads and see the general reception as profoundly negative one. Heck, the whole reason this whole thing even 'blew up' is because of how ugly the reaction has been to these videos, so the last thing I would say is that the community is taking criticism by Anita better than it does from those within the industry.

The project triggered a campaign of sexist harassment that Amanda Marcotte in Slate magazine described as an "absolute avalanche of misogynist abuse", in which "[e]very access point they could exploit was used to try to get to her".[14][2] Helen Lewis of The New York Times reported that Sarkeesian was e-mailed images of herself being raped by video game characters.[15] Attempts were made to hack her Twitter and Google accounts, doctored images of her were posted online, threats of rape were made against her on Twitter, and negative comments were posted to her YouTube and Facebook pages.[16][4][17] Her Wikipedia article was repeatedly vandalized with images of sex acts.[18] Her website was subjected to denial-of-service attacks, and there were efforts to obtain and distribute her personal contact information.[19]

That's not how I would describe a group positively reevaluating its preferred content in the face of outside criticism. And I think even you would admit that people who caveat by saying they're still for the underlying message/goal spend far more time talking about what's wrong with Anita's work than talking about how it's on the right track or why they think things are wrong or how to change it.

Second, you admit you have no personal experience in the romance community, so how could you know whether feminist critique of the genre is coming predominately from the 'inside' or 'outside'? Or how the romance community is even reacting to those criticisms or if they even treat them differently based on their perceived origin? Same thing for SFF. Unless you're using gender composition as a shorthand to determine the origins of critique and the level of reception by the community, it doesn't seem like you have a strong leg to stand on here. Wouldn't you want better evidence than conjecture before making this kind of positive claim or suggestion?

Finally, this fundamentally presumes that Anita is an outsider and is understood to be one. To GAF-like communities that might be true, but to the game community at large? Games belong to more than just game news site and internet forum goers. Some may consider her an insider or an outsider. I feel like you're trying to make broad conclusions based on insufficient anecdotal evidence.

 

[Tamale]

A video about the Oscars, 500,00 views. A video about the hunger games, 280,000 views. Then a video about her kickstarter, 380,000 views. Then her first video about video game tropes, 2,000,000 views. Quadrupled. That is not normal. That explosion is not because of youtube, that's because the gaming community went crazy. Her viewership didn't suddenly explode when she made the kickstarter video, it was only after the gaming community was brought to a frothing frenzy of controversy by the time of her first video release.

Well she most likely got that crazy jump in views because a lot Youtube viewers are gamers. Check the top channels and you'll see a majority are gaming oriented. She pretty much stirred up the nest when she criticized their loved hobby.

 

[Galactic Fork]

But they aren't part of the actual game, and I imagine most people who played the game have not seen those ads. Ignorance isn't an excuse I can agree, but I bought the game on a steam sale, and many others just bought it off the shelf, new when it came out or used years later. Surely that's a entirely seperate problem?

Would you agree that 1) Regardless of whether or not you saw that ad, that it is an example of developers (or at least the publisher's ad people) "utiliz[ing] the brutalization of women’s bodies, ... as an indicator of just how harsh, cruel and unforgiving their game worlds are." 2) and that Bonnie is not an example of this subject at all?

Is it just that she exists in a game that also uses this trope that she belongs in the video? How are the ads not being in the actual game, but still fitting the theme, make Bonnie who doesn't fit the theme at all belong in the video?

I just don't understand. But OK. For the sake of argument, what would you have said if I'd agreed that those ads are completely not background decoration.

By that I mean that context can be used to, and I mean this in a loose sense, though it may make me sound ignorant, "justify" certain happenings/aspects of a game/gameworld/characters etc etc. Justify is a very poor choice of words, but I'm not sure how else to phrase it.

And again, this is where my context argument comes in, as although RDR features some women that some may find negative, it also features representation of women that some may find positive. It's well aware it's doing both so to speak.

So, basically you're saying that Bonnie and Abigail give the game positivity (weird, positivity triggers my spell check) cred (but cred doesn't?) that counteracts the using of sexualized and passive women in the background to show the player how dark and disturbing they could make the setting. That it makes it unlike all the other games that do the same thing. And putting it in a list of games that do the same thing is wrong?

Is this like that carbon footprint credit thing where you can totally be completely non green, but since you spent lots of money on the credit you can say you're earth friendly?

OK, that was mean. And I was kinda venting there. But all right. You bring up having good representations to counter the bad. This is a decent argument. However it's a little shallow when talking about women's representation at this point. Because it's not ONLY that one aspect. There are a few fronts that are all being addressed when pointing out the tropes.

1) yes, small range of representation, most bad.
2) these representations are usually tied very closely to the woman being a woman, her body, or her sexuality.
3) The usage of women as passive victims, not as active participants
4) Using women as game pieces in contests between men.

These aren't all of them, but they are all intertwined. So even if you address 1) with having Bonnie in the game, the other aspects of using that trope remain.

It's more annoying to me personally in games that do other things right, actually. It just highlights the fact that the game designers fell back on one of these tropes to get their point across. It's something you notice.

Spoilers for the sake of it:

Spoiler

Bonnie MacFarlane, rescues main character, is very much a country girl and is aware "city folk" may try to take advantage of her based on their pre-concieved notions, hard-working and tough. Abigail Marston, former prostitute, main character and her fall in love, she wants main character out of the gang life and to be at home more for their son/for the sake of their family, doesn't beat around the bush with main character. Luisa Fortuna, a revolutionary fighter who believes in her and her people's right to freedom, willing to die for that cause, a leader within the revolution, however the man she is in love with is cheating on her, is somewhat unwilling to recognize that.

Those are the ones I can recall.

Spoiler

Bonnie's great, but Luisa? Really. She isn't just in love with him, and he isn't cheating on her. He's not cheating on her because he doesn't recognize them as being in a relationship. She thinks they are going to get married and he doesn't even know her name. He just uses her as a sex toy and she is still devoted to him. When she is killed trying to save him, he still doesn't even know who she is. How is that a good depiction? Women have been shown as love sick and clueless for horrible men forever and it's not flattering. It's the classic women being fooled by their emotions bit.

 

[Metal Gear?!]

I think this is a bit uncharitable. My issue with her showing six seconds of objectionable trope from a game and then moving on to the next example is that she doesn't attempt to evaluate the games holistically. No, having a single good female character doesn't automatically absolve a game for having a bad female character. But I don't think isolating a single mechanic or scene from Bioshock or Red Dead tells me anything about whether those works are part of the problem or part of the solution. I've played Red Dead and I know that she's giving the game short shrift, but I've never played Bioshock and so I can only speculate, precisely because I don't trust her to present me that game's treatment of women as a coherent whole, rather than as a distorted and misleading collection of dialog snippets.

No analysis of Shakespeare's treatment of Jews is going to just mention a couple of lines of dialog from The Merchant of Venice and leave it at that. No analysis of "the Jew in early modern European literature" is going to content itself with a slipshod, decontextualized reading of a few lines of Shakespeare just to support its thesis. Shakespeare scholars would be outraged, and rightly so. I really object to this sort of analysis on principle, and it frustrates me that so many people are willing to give it a pass just because they agree with its conclusions.

So this ultimately boils down to a "but my favorite game can't be that sexist" complaint?

"No analysis of Shakespeare's treatment of Jews is going to just mention a couple of lines of dialog from The Merchant of Venice and leave it at that" - sure

"No analysis of "the Jew in early modern European literature" is going to content itself with a slipshod, decontextualized reading of a few lines of Shakespeare just to support its thesis." - well sort of...

...but if you were talking about antisemitism in that culture and how pervasive it was then you might just mention it among many examples of popular culture attitudes... and when you get around to positive examples later you might mention that there are some themes in the work that emphasize Shylock's shared humanity, why not.

Ultimately, super Shakespeare fans aren't going to send you death threats and your home address to you on twitter over it, because they're not in denial that Shakespeare expressed anti-Semitic attitudes and wrote for an anti-Semitic audience.

 

[Brakke]

On a recent Idle Thumbs (this one? https://www.idlethumbs.net/idlethumbs/episodes/ridonkulous-rift) mostly about Internet jerks, Sean Vanaman was talking about how weird it is that Sarkeesian catches so, so much flak. That if these videos had been coming out when he was fifteen or whatever, if he could watch a cool young lady say smart things he hadn't even considered about games, he'd be "ensorcelled".

At least one young buck lives in Sean Vanaman's More Happier world:

aftr wtching the fem freq vid tim schafer twtd i, a 15 year old literally sat in silence for 5 mins in amzmnt, admirtion and thght

https://twitter.com/internetmaxwell/status/507448973737484288

It's cool such a thing as this exists that such a cool person as Tim Schafer might share it that such a cool young buck as this kid could be then gobsmacked by new thoughts.

 

[-Cwalat-]

This isn't really what she's saying. She's saying that most people that do commit these crimes are benign. Seemingly normal people like an office mate or the cashier that checks out your groceries. Not mustache twirling villains like it portrayed most of the time.

I get what you are saying.

Heavy Rain i believe is one of the few exceptions in games where characters are portrayed in a realistic matter, somewhat, one example being the scene between one of the clients of the prostitute Lauren that tries to rape her in the beginning of the game.

There is a lack of these realistic portrayals of people in games though, so that might have something to do with it.

But then again, i don't get why she is against violence towards women and rape... but doesn't seem to bring up any arguments towards violence in general in games. Shouldn't that be the main points if she truly thinks it's awful that rape and violence towards women is portrayed very flimsically in games? Why is she excluding the violence towards men in games?

 

[Morrigan Stark]

I get what you are saying.

Heavy Rain i believe is one of the few exceptions in games where characters are portrayed in a realistic matter, somewhat, one example being the scene between one of the clients of the prostitute Lauren that tries to rape her in the beginning of the game.

There is a lack of these realistic portrayals of people in games though, so that might have something to do with it.

But then again, i don't get why she is against violence towards women and rape... but doesn't seem to bring up any arguments towards violence in general in games. Shouldn't that be the main points if she truly thinks it's awful that rape and violence towards women is portrayed very flimsically in games? Why is she excluding the violence towards men in games?

Because the subject of her videos is to explore gendered tropes?

Also, she did bring up violence in games in general every now and then, but the focus is on gender issues.

 

[YesNOnoNOYes]

On a recent Idle Thumbs (this one? https://www.idlethumbs.net/idlethumbs/episodes/ridonkulous-rift) mostly about Internet jerks, Sean Vanaman was talking about how weird it is that Sarkeesian catches so, so much flak. That if these videos had been coming out when he was fifteen or whatever, if he could watch a cool young lady say smart things he hadn't even considered about games, he'd be "ensorcelled".

At least one young buck lives in Sean Vanaman's More Happier world:


https://twitter.com/internetmaxwell/status/507448973737484288

It's cool such a thing as this exists that such a cool person as Tim Schafer might share it that such a cool young buck as this kid could be then gobsmacked by new thoughts.

This is pretty awesome :>

Thanks for sharing! Glad to see that there are indicators that new perspectives are being shared and formed. It can only lead to more progress in the future of gaming <3

Faith in humanity +1

 

[MikeRox]

What games are people playing where rape is such a common aspect? I can't even think of a game which has rape as a part of the story

I think I'll stick with the games I'm playing.

I also think there's a lot of over analysis going on with this entire topic.

 

[YesNOnoNOYes]

What games are people playing where rape is such a common aspect? I can't even think of a game which has rape as a part of the story

I think I'll stick with the games I'm playing.

I also think there's a lot of over analysis going on with this entire topic.

Did you see the video or are you just drive-by-commenting?

 

[-Cwalat-]

Because the subject of her videos is to explore gendered tropes?

Also, she did bring up violence in games in general every now and then, but the focus is on gender issues.

So, then i ask again, Why is she excluding the violence towards the other gender in games?

 

[restraining order]

So, then i ask again, Why is she excluding the violence towards the other gender in games?

Because a lot of people paid her a lot of money to create content about issues concerning women in videogames.

 

[antigoon]

So, then i ask again, Why is she excluding the violence towards the other gender in games?

"disposable men" is a perfectly valid topic to discuss. It is not the point of Sarkeesian's video series. It's okay to have a narrow focus.

 

[Vice]

So, then i ask again, Why is she excluding the violence towards the other gender in games?

The same answer to all the "why is this all about women" question: She was paid to make Tropes vs Women in game a series focused on Tropes about Women.

 

[Morrigan Stark]

So, then i ask again, Why is she excluding the violence towards the other gender in games?

Probably for the same reason she doesn't focus on the price of tea in China in her videos.

I didn't know men white knighting Sarkeesian was still a hot topic on GAF. Learning is fun!

....?

 

[Morrigan Stark]

nvm

 

[Galactic Fork]

But then again, i don't get why she is against violence towards women and rape... but doesn't seem to bring up any arguments towards violence in general in games. Shouldn't that be the main points if she truly thinks it's awful that rape and violence towards women is portrayed very flimsically in games? Why is she excluding the violence towards men in games?

She does. It's about agency. From the video: "When the victims are men, sexual objectification and sexual or domestic violence are almost never ingredients in the scenario. Even the countless male thugs and henchmen the player mows down in these games are depicted as active aggressors, not characterized as passive victims."

She's not against violence in general. She doesn't say anything about the existence of female enemies. Nobody said anything about all the women bandits in Skyrim or other elder scrolls games, or other games that have random women enemies. They are activly participating aggressors. When it comes to female enemies, the issue isn't about killing them, it becomes about the presentation, the sexualization of them. It's the gendered aspect that is the issue in the video (though this video was about background women, rather than women enemies). I wish more games would have generic female enemies along side the male enemies.

 

[Lime]

Manveer Heir (Bioware dev, lead designer of ME4) speaks up

This actually makes me more interested in the next Mass Effect game despite being cold on Bioware and the franchise after ME2 and ME3.

 

[Yrael]

Manveer Heir (Bioware dev, lead designer of ME4) speaks up

This actually makes me more interested in the next Mass Effect game despite being cold on Bioware and the franchise after ME2 and ME3.

I'm really pleased to see that developers like Heir are stepping forward to voice their support like this. Gives me a lot of hope.

 

[YesNOnoNOYes]

Manveer Heir (Bioware dev, lead designer of ME4) speaks up

This actually makes me more interested in the next Mass Effect game despite being cold on Bioware and the franchise after ME2 and ME3.

oh wow, those lines. incredible, spot on and the kind of response that bowled me over !

i played ME and ME2, skipping ME3. im now very interested what they have in offer next

thanks for plugging that, lime!

 

[ChawlieTheFair]

Would you agree that 1) Regardless of whether or not you saw that ad, that it is an example of developers (or at least the publisher's ad people) "utiliz[ing] the brutalization of women’s bodies, ... as an indicator of just how harsh, cruel and unforgiving their game worlds are." 2) and that Bonnie is not an example of this subject at all?

Is it just that she exists in a game that also uses this trope that she belongs in the video? How are the ads not being in the actual game, but still fitting the theme, make Bonnie who doesn't fit the theme at all belong in the video?

I just don't understand. But OK. For the sake of argument, what would you have said if I'd agreed that those ads are completely not background decoration.



So, basically you're saying that Bonnie and Abigail give the game positivity (weird, positivity triggers my spell check) cred (but cred doesn't?) that counteracts the using of sexualized and passive women in the background to show the player how dark and disturbing they could make the setting. That it makes it unlike all the other games that do the same thing. And putting it in a list of games that do the same thing is wrong?

Is this like that carbon footprint credit thing where you can totally be completely non green, but since you spent lots of money on the credit you can say you're earth friendly?

OK, that was mean. And I was kinda venting there. But all right. You bring up having good representations to counter the bad. This is a decent argument. However it's a little shallow when talking about women's representation at this point. Because it's not ONLY that one aspect. There are a few fronts that are all being addressed when pointing out the tropes.

1) yes, small range of representation, most bad.
2) these representations are usually tied very closely to the woman being a woman, her body, or her sexuality.
3) The usage of women as passive victims, not as active participants
4) Using women as game pieces in contests between men.

These aren't all of them, but they are all intertwined. So even if you address 1) with having Bonnie in the game, the other aspects of using that trope remain.

It's more annoying to me personally in games that do other things right, actually. It just highlights the fact that the game designers fell back on one of these tropes to get their point across. It's something you notice.

Spoiler

Bonnie's great, but Luisa? Really. She isn't just in love with him, and he isn't cheating on her. He's not cheating on her because he doesn't recognize them as being in a relationship. She thinks they are going to get married and he doesn't even know her name. He just uses her as a sex toy and she is still devoted to him. When she is killed trying to save him, he still doesn't even know who she is. How is that a good depiction? Women have been shown as love sick and clueless for horrible men forever and it's not flattering. It's the classic women being fooled by their emotions bit.

Sorry for not responding for so long.

Ok, so for the ads, they are not part of the game is basically my point. Being that I can agree with the argument that she doesn't show all sides to her argument based on the fact that her donators gave money to a "video games vs women" series, I can think it is fair for me to make the argument that those ads are not video games. Are they background decoration? Yes, but for train stations and web banners . I also agree they are sexualizing those women in the ads.

For the bolded:
I think this where we agree. I think that if a game is representing women both postively and negatively, it is then unfair to call it out on tropes. Now if a game or games ONLY have negative representations of women, that is where I believe it is fair to call them out for these said tropes. I'm not denying these tropes don't exist or that they aren't bad, if they are the only examples of women in the game.

Luisa:

Spoiler

I can also say that the said dude (can't remember his name) is a classic cheater/drunk. It's a two sided conflict. Luisa is very strong in terms of her beliefs for the revolution and what she believes is right, but is failing to see the issues between her and the man. The man is pretty consistently shown as an asshole quite frankly, and of the two I imagine most would consider Luisa a better person. He's just an animal, she's thinking of a better life. I think her failure to see their relationship problems doesn't really detract from her overall character.

 

[Galactic Fork]

Sorry for not responding for so long.

Ok, so for the ads, they are not part of the game is basically my point. Being that I can agree with the argument that she doesn't show all sides to her argument based on the fact that her donators gave money to a "video games vs women" series, I can think it is fair for me to make the argument that those ads are not video games. Are they background decoration? Yes, but for train stations and web banners . I also agree they are sexualizing those women in the ads.

Can you clarify "doesn't show all sides to her argument"?

Also, it's an ad for a video game... The series is Tropes vs women in video games. Video games as in the video game industry. Ads are part of the industry. A big part. Her previous video on background decoration also showed how the video game industry back in the arcade days used women to decorate their machines in the ads (see the first video for lots of images of ads). The hitman ads were especially suited for this video because the people in them were dead. They are all on topic.

For the bolded:
I think this where we agree. I think that if a game is representing women both postively and negatively, it is then unfair to call it out on tropes. Now if a game or games ONLY have negative representations of women, that is where I believe it is fair to call them out for these said tropes. I'm not denying these tropes don't exist or that they aren't bad, if they are the only examples of women in the game.

I'm not sure you read what you bolded, but I think we're getting somewhere. There is more to it than simply a positive vs. negative ratio though. The 2 through 4 I listed don't just need to have more positive examples to offset them, they should be reduced. By a lot. Because it's not just about how they are treated compared to other women, it's about how they are treated compared to men in similar situations. Because it's not just negative, it's demeaning, and almost exclusively happen to women.

And it's not really about calling out, but pointing out. Giving examples. Showing it happens a lot in the industry. And it does. She's not saying this game uses this trope therefore the whole game is bad or even mostly bad, and they're not. Just that it uses this trope that is prevalent throughout the industry, and it does. That way, when a developer is making a game, and they realize they're about to use one of these tropes, they may stop and think, "hmm maybe I'll do something else with these female characters that doesn't remove their agency." there would be much rejoicing because we'd have something new, and one less demeaning example of these tropes.

Luisa:

Spoiler

I can also say that the said dude (can't remember his name) is a classic cheater/drunk. It's a two sided conflict. Luisa is very strong in terms of her beliefs for the revolution and what she believes is right, but is failing to see the issues between her and the man. The man is pretty consistently shown as an asshole quite frankly, and of the two I imagine most would consider Luisa a better person. He's just an animal, she's thinking of a better life. I think her failure to see their relationship problems doesn't really detract from her overall character.

Spoiler

How is he cheating when he doesn't even recognize a relationship? There is no relationship. It's all in Luisa's head. To him Luisa is just one of his girls. And hey, I think she believes in her cause, but it's a common thing in stories to have the woman be a doting lovesick puppy to the cruel man who only sees her as a sex object. And she sacrificed herself for him, for nothing. Her whole story was pretty tragic. He shoulda died, and she reluctantly take over the resistance. She'd have done better anyway.