“People are talking about women and games seriously; people are taking the critiques seriously,” Sarkeesian says as she stirs her tea. “It’s been a huge shift. This discussion is becoming more mainstream.”
A blond woman sitting at the next table before an array of New York City street maps begins squirming excitedly in her seat. “Are you talking about the article about gaming in the New York Times yesterday? I read it!” she says excitedly. “Did you write that? It was great!”
Fantastic article, horrible title (hence why I’m using a generic placeholder title instead). She’s not gaming’s “greatest adversary”. In fact, Sarkeesian – and people like her, trying to create more diversity in every aspect of gaming – are gaming’s greatest asset.
So we won’t get to play the game how we like and have content that we would enjoy, we will have to play the games the way Sarkeesian and other feminists permit us to play.
Better not play any videogame at all.
Complete and utter bullshit, and you know it. Had you actually *watched* the material she and others put out, you would know that they are not asking for current games to stop existing, but that *additional* stuff be made that covers a wider area of interests.
It’s not “stop making this and only make that” – it’s “keep making this, but it’d be great if we could also get some of that”. The fact that you do not understand something as simple as that, and that you feel so threatened by that, is incredibly worrying.
You realize, Thom, that you are whining?
If it is truly as you said, that all they want is for “additional” games to be made, then they should shut up and make them themselves.
Leave the existing game shops and developers alone to continue creating the games they want for the players who want to play them.
Anything else is sour grapes.
That is why it most certainly not “as simple as that.”
I’m not a gamer, and can barely follow the entire story, but I know a rat when I encounter one.
Why? Are we no longer allowed to voice our opinions?
You do realise that the most active people in this story are actually female game developers, right? Who make games?
Consistent death, rape, and mutilation threats are “sour grapes”. K.
Gripe away then. Just don’t be surprised at the yawns in response.
Death threats et al? First, I do recall reading many references to such, but very little proof offered. Second, I have seen such rhetoric directed towards the #GamerGaters in copious quantities. I see very little whining on their collective part for being the recipients of such.
Translation: “Don’t you dare criticize anything I like!”
Have you never heard that criticism can actually be good? You can learn from your mistakes once someone points them out to you, you can come up with different ways of doing things, you can add more depth to characters in movies and books and games and whatnot and so on. The whole world would be dumber if no one was ever allowed to criticize anything or anyone.
Yeah I agree. Criticism is good, but it goes both ways.
She does raise some valid concerns which we should have a look at and reflect upon, but she also has many points ripped out of context or that are simply not true. And it is not misogynistic to point that out simply because the person who made the claims is female. Criticism really goes both ways. Hiding behind a gender to deflect that is sexism.
Of course, I don’t support calling everyone who disagrees with you misogynists, either, and hiding behind gender should not be employed by either party. Alas, *both* parties use the tactics.
In general I agree with her point, though I’ve never been able to watch a single episode of hers through. It all makes me cringe too much.
Criticism is good if it is true. Sarkeesian lies a lot. It really comes down to “they don’t make the games I like to play”.
Sarkeesian is demonizing a big part of society and some people get angry over that. Some people even lash out at her the same way she lashes out at them.
Unless she criticized a game that you developed, I pity you and all other gamers that identify themselves by the games. Her criticism of the games is not criticism of you personally, but sexism is rife in the social group that identifies as gamer.
I like the hitman games. According to her they are made so you can simulate murdering women and playing with their corpses. That strongly implies to me that she sees people who like that game as the sort of people who would like to do that in real life.
Gamergate isn’t about sexism but about attacking the thing gamers love. There are sexist in every group of people and online they feel safe to voice their opinion so they seem more voluminous.
If Sarkeesian had started a foundation to promote certain types of games nobody would have been against that. Instead she poked the hornet nest and then cried murder that she was attacked.
Gamers are mindless idiots that exhibit hive like mentality?
Not sure if you really thought that analogy through. Like, they can’t help but make rape/death threats?
Game making is a busyness and/or an art, either you are in it to make money and you cater to the customer wants. If i had made candy crush (the most played computer game in the world currently), should i have considered obese people feeling uneasy about the theme of the game? Those who make games as an art care less about sales numbers and usually have an agenda or a cause, that is also fine and dandy.
Video games are about fantasy, to do what you can not in real life, be whom you are not, live a life that you otherwise could not.
That is a straw man. Nobody feels threatened by extra content (there was even a funding for a game in development by radical feminists, which were then harassed – by the SJW team). People feel threatened by the authoritarian moral police that comes after you and shames you when your views do not align with theirs. It’s not about morals or inclusiveness, it’s about power and control. And it has happened to various other industries and movements. Read up on the scifi/fantasy literature scene or atheism.
Furthermore, Anita Sarkeesian has a very shady history. For example: she worked as a marketeer and coordinator for a pick-up artist for seminars teaching men on how to seduce women. It’s incredible how people fall for her carefully cherry picked points that often are completely ripped out of context to convince less critical readers/viewers. As soon as people point out the flaws in her reasoning, she successfully redirected that criticism as an attack against women. Sure there was harassment going on, but she made sure the baby was thrown out with the bath water. “Listen and believe”, rather than consider and think critically (in both ways).
You may want to read http://guardianlv.com/2014/11/anita-sarkeesian-unmasked-feminist-ic… to get a better picture of the situation.
Also, fun fact, the troll who sent her that death threat from your previous topic (which the FBI declared as no danger) was discovered by gamergate supporters, yet Anita Sarkeesian refuses to press charges. Seems like she was not too bothered by it after all.
Edited 2014-11-27 11:57 UTC
You’re deflecting. Even if what you said was true that still wouldn’t undermine her point. Argue the point she is raising.
What would she have gained if she had decided to press charges, though? It wouldn’t have stopped anyone else from continuing with the threats and attacks, and it might even have been the same as throwing in even more fuel. Sometimes it’s better to just drop the knife and walk away.
Edited 2014-11-27 12:01 UTC
I’m not, the counter points were made many times but are silenced and dismissed as anti-women.
With that statement I am merely pointing out that her credibility is to be taken with a large grain of salt and that she is not the great feminist everyone thinks she is.
If a political figure who has a history of lies, shady practices and broken promises makes a case, then yeah I think it’s justified to point that out so that people take his points with more scepticism. It does not mean it’s untrue, but it does not mean you should blindly accept what he’s saying simply because it feels good somehow. That’s how populism starts, you just say what people want to hear and get votes/money.
Yes, I agree, that is why the police recommends to not go public with the death threat in the first place but she ignored that part.
Edited 2014-11-27 12:07 UTC
To be frank, even if the figure had a history of living like a Jesus, being perfect example of a good, honest human being and all, you should still take their words with scepticism. Only fools blindly accept everything they hear.
Well good point there
Though I think at some point you simply have to trust people as you can’t verify every single detail. A dubious history should simply make the “trust threshold” a bit higher.
If it’s better to “walk away,” then she should by all means do, and cease to bring it, or any other alleged death threat, up ever again. Please spare all of us the ordeal.
Basic legitimacy for her claims of being victimized against, for starters.
Ok… Let me see… Wasn’t that guy from Brazil, where filing any complaint with the US law enforcement is basically useless?
What does that have to do with the case at hand? I don’t even know what you’re talking about BTW.
Death/physical harm/rape threats are a serious issue, if you’re dealing with them seriously then you have to get the part of the system involved with both; conducting the proper investigations and with detaining/prosecuting/removing the people behind/responsible for those threats from society.
What you most definitively do not do is exploit those threats for profit. Why? Because it makes your arguments suspect. If you’re making a career as a professional victim, it’s clear that the last thing you’re interested is in actually solving the issue, because then you stop being a victim, and such you find yourself out of business so to speak.
I find the dissonance of the social justice crowd as deafening as their idiotic male rights counter parts. They’re the two faces of the same shitty coin of people who are not interested in solving real issues, as much as they’re just looking to exploit those issues to play the victim to give their lives a meaning. It also allows them to shield themselves for having to honestly evaluate the validity of their own arguments, while giving them the tools to emotionally manipulate others into accepting those same arguments.
Meanwhile the real victims, both women and men, continue to suffer the real effects of actual victimization.
Personally, I don’t really object to that. I think diversity in games is really and truly a laudable goal. The more game developers explore new territory, new mechanics, new story telling devices, etc., the more the industry will flourish.
That said, she is not arguing for game diversity. She is arguing for game developers to incorporate a particular set of values when designing their games – i.e. she is saying “game developers should take feminist ideals into account when designing their games”. She then goes through many examples of games that do not do this, gleefully pointing out the “sins” they commit as if it is a checklist of what you should not do when developing a game. There is absolutely nothing new here, it is just a different spin on a morality argument – she is just leveraging a different set of morals than in the past.
The main difference between this and past “morality” attacks on gaming is primarily in the choice of venue. Past attacks on gaming over violence, nudity, etc. where made through the legal system (lobbying for law) whereas this is a direct attempt to shame game developers, using political correctness as a weapon. Either way, it is an attempt to reduce diversity by introducing a non market driven force in an effort to mold the end result into something a particular demographic deems acceptable to their own worldview.
Why would you spend so much time pointing out all the problems with “this” if your goal is simply to make something different? Why not just outline what “that” should look like? Or better yet, just go and make “that”. You already know why…
Honestly, what I find incredibly worrying is that so many people actually buy into this tactic wholesale.
I actually agree that there definitely could and should be more games that appeal to feminist ethos, but the reason there aren’t isn’t because game developers need “enlightenment”, its because they probably wouldn’t sell. Game developers make games to make money, not to further an agenda or promote a set of ethos.
I’m not against feminism in gaming. I’m against politics in gaming, and this my friend is nothing but politics.
Here is a though experiment for you. Take GTA V, and pass it through the “filter” of her videos, removing all the “problems” she outlines and molding it into a product that she would consider representative of the kinds of games she wants made… Does that game still make 2 billion dollars?
If not, why the f*ck would Rockstar want to make it??
From what I’ve seen she is not even advocating anything concrete. Just pointing out that women characters are sued as tropes.
In all honesty – please tell me where she says that these games should not include that? Watched a few times her videos and interviews and still can’t see the thing that you* are complaining she is saying. If you heard it “somewhere” or feel it being implied, then I have little to say.
* – plural, you are not alone being paranoid like this
Yes, women characters are absolutely used as tropes. So are male characters. So are lots of things. But the implication is that these tropes are harmful, or is she not implying that?
I’d be perfectly fine with the argument that she is just trying to get developers to diversify and try and develop games that don’t use these kinds of things as crutches. Really, I am. Problem is that isn’t how the public at large perceives it – and I’m not talking about the #GamerGate crowd, I’m actually talking about her supporters.
Look on this board. There are lots of examples of people quite bluntly pointing at something like GTA V and saying things like “we don’t need that in games”, or “if you need those kinds of things in games you have mental problems”, etc. etc. The result of all this mess isn’t “lets get more games made that portray women positively”, it’s “lets shame developers so they stop making games that portray women negatively”.
Do you guys even hear yourselves? Don’t buy the game then. I don’t have a problem with more diversity, but that isn’t what you really want…
You, Thom, and quite a number of others seem to be talking out of both sides of your mouths. I am opposed to censorship, whether I like what is being censored or not. That means a game like GTA V, which (with me having kids and all) is definitely a no go in my house, should still get made. Obviously some people like it, it made a lot of money…
That is just it. It isn’t her that is saying that. But here you are, obviously trying to defend her (ironic). Lets try this: Do you think games like GTA V, which obviously has an audience, should continue to get made? I’m not asking if you like it, I’m not asking if you think it is harmful or not, I’m asking should Rockstar continue making games in the GTA series (hookers and all)?
ps. Im just using GTA as a convenient proxy.
I find it quite odd that when I present a simple clarifying question like this I always get no reply…
Its not a trick question. Do you think games like GTA should still get made?
Because if you don’t all this bullshit about “we just want more diversity in gaming” is just that – bullshit.
Edited 2014-11-30 04:04 UTC
You will not get an answer.
I thought those (mostly left-leaning) people were smart, enlightened folks but it turns out they’re on the same side as the puritan right-wing, only using different arguments to achieve pretty much the same goal. Arguments that may look appealing on the surface but quickly crumble once you subject them to a fair amount of criticism.
And rather than addressing this criticism, they turn to silencing, shaming, insulting and bullying others for speaking out (there is plenty of evidence for that, but the media ignore it. Heh, just read Thom’s posts). Apparently, the idea of freedom of speech is only useful as long as they are doing the speech.
There are many more authoritarian minded people than I thought there would be. It’s a sad thought, really.
How much longer are we going to have to listen to your immature pop feminism and misandry Thom? Your recent holiday where other people took over the site was a welcome relief to many of us.
Edited 2014-11-30 16:49 UTC
No, that’s not at all what she’s saying. She’s simply trying to point out to various things and make developers pay more attention to them and then evaluate whether they should add some more depth or avoid common tropes and stereotypes.
Who’s taking them away from you? The more I hear this kind of rhetoric, the more I’m convinced that the people who are threatened by media criticism are actually a bunch of kids who are worried their parents might find out what they’ve been playing. Out here in the real world, virtually every kind of media is subject to criticism. It’s a part of life. If people are repeating those criticisms, it might be because they have merit.
In other words, if a game doesn’t have dead prostitutes littering the scenery or women being raped (or about to be raped), it isn’t worth playing?
That’s really the most important point to be found in her videos – how violence against women is so utterly casual in video games, and is almost exclusively set dressing.
It’s rather disturbing, and moreso that you think it’s necessary to enjoy a game.
Either that, or you have no f–king idea what she’s actually discussing, and are actually proactive in the preservation of your ignorance.
Edited 2014-11-27 20:22 UTC
It’s GAMES! Are you going to fight for the rights of game characters? That’s ridiculous! The movie industry is full of rapes and murder and stuff, the book industry even more. The game industry as well. That is all fictional. Dragons are being killed, PETA never complained about that did they? People are telling stories. When I was kid I was told stories about trolls eating children. I never called the police to stop the trolls, should I have?
I dont… I don’t know how to respond for this. It doesn’t have anything to do with my argument or my question. This is just… bizarre.
And, as a matter of point, PETA does complain about violence against animals in video games. PETA is also batshit crazy.
http://features.peta.org/mario-kills-tanooki/
Also, I’ve noticed casual violence against animals in video games is far less common then common sexual violence against women.
The point is that we don’t care about violence against fictional characters. They are not real. No need to be upset or to fight for their rights, they don’t exist. It’s ridiculous. Chess games are sexist. The queen is not as important as the king. You are advised to sacrifice the queen to save the king. Nobody fucking care, this is happening in an imaginary world, not in our reality. GTA is a fucking video game, no cop has been hurt making this game, the characters are computer binary data, nobody is actually killed.
We also don’t care about violence in movies, because it’s not real. But… you don’t seem to understand what a trope is. Look it up. The complaint is simple – women characters are disproportionately used as sexualized decorations.
And yes, there is scientifically proven link between sensitivity to specific type of violence and it’s prevalence in media. Even women are affected in the same way. The prime example is “What was she wearing” issue.
I didn’t know what trope meant (english is not my native language) so thank you for this new word. I looked it up here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trope_(literature). I don’t get what you mean by “What she was wearing” issue. I see your other comment about Lara Croft and unless you live in some place like Saudi Arabia, she’s wearing what girls are wearing everyday.
Anyway indeed I agree women are sexualized in porn movies and some games. That’s pretty much the point of those movies. Do you live in a muslim country? Maybe there is something different in your culture that I don’t get or something. Can you explain the problem like you would explain to a 3 years old, please?
No, no it isn’t. And if you link me that study from last time again, I really recommend you to actually read it. The abstract and conclusion are in sharp contrast to the method and results sections which clearly indicate “no significance” and their 3rd method even disappeared without further mention. They pulled that conclusion out of their ass because that is what they wanted it to be. And everyone who does not read further than the abstract and conclusion (most do), is suckered into the narrative.
However, what is proven is that video games with bad controls and mechanics do cause aggression, aka frustration, and that is completely unrelated to the content of the game. In other words, Super Mario can (and probably does) cause more aggression than GTA.
Edited 2014-12-01 11:39 UTC
Name all video games containing prostitutes and/or women being raped (or about to be raped) made last year. Seriously, go ahead and name them. I doubt you will run out of fingers…
Roughly 600-1000 commercial video games get made each year. I play at least 20 or so of them, more or less – none of the ones I play contain any of those things at all.
What is the problem again?
Edited 2014-11-27 22:43 UTC
Did you notice how literally nothing you said addresses my comment at all?
I said the gist of Sarkeesian’s complaint is how in many games, the presence of women in many games (esp. triple-a titles) are limited to set dressing, many as victims of sexual violence, and that is what she was advocating change for.
Twitterfire said that if the content she is complaining about is necessary to games, and that games wouldn’t be worth playing for him if said content was no longer in games.
This means that he either requires sexual violence against women as set dressing for the games he plays, or he doesn’t actually know what she is advocating.
As for your irrelevant complaints, I don’t know which games specifically released in the past year depict this. The games I play tend to not be very violent at all.
But I do come across it from time to time, and while I’m only slightly bothered by it, the fact that people are so absolutely opposed to not having women depicted that way is far, far worse.
Well then I give you credit for at least being intellectually honest, unlike Thom and others here who insist she is just advocating for more games with positive depictions of woman. What I see (and you seem to agree with from your statement) is that what she is really doing is advocating against existing games negative depictions of woman.
She also complained about the damsel-in-distress trope (and many others having nothing at all to do with prostitution, violence, or rape). Things that most people do not find offensive at all, even most women don’t find offensive.
I don’t actually require a damsel in distress in my games, but I would like to keep that option open…
That’s just it. There are hundreds of games that don’t depict woman the way you describe. My favorite game from the last few years was Tomb Raider, which I think all said incorporates a fairly positive depiction of women. It has nothing to do with this woman or her videos. Games absent of prostitution and rape are pretty much the norm. Even in AAA top selling titles it is the norm.
So she is not really advocating for more positive depictions of woman, and neither are you – because such games already exist and get made and there is no reason to demonize existing games in order to make that happen.
What she (and you apparently) want is to censor games that contain things that offend your morality. At least come out and say it, don’t be coy. No matter how you try to twist it around you are talking about censorship.
How is this a good thing? So censorship is ok as long as you are on the winning side? How would you have felt if Jack Thompson had won 6 years ago?
It always comes back to the same fundamental argument… If you don’t like the content of a game don’t buy it. Why does it have to go beyond that?
Edited 2014-11-28 00:53 UTC
I’m not sure it’s even possible for a female character in an action game like that to meet with Sarkeesian’s approval. She’s used Lara Croft as an example of the “fighting fuck toy” trope, along with characters like Bayonetta and Juliet Starling, but even if Lara was made less attractive/sexual to remove the “objectification”, she’d simply be a “Mrs. Male Character” or “Man with Boobs”.
Sarkeesian argues that a positive female video game character should value feminine qualities of cooperation over masculine competitiveness, and would be emotionally expressive and nurturing rather than hardened and aggressive. Of course there are interesting characters with those qualities, and they’re a good fit for some games, but certain scenarios and game styles just wouldn’t work with that kind of character. A female character who isn’t a bit “masculine” wouldn’t realistically put herself in the situations depicted in many action games.
I don’t disagree, I just don’t care much about her opinion of things (obviously) – I have my own. Anyway, from what I have read lots of noteworthy feminists have had at least some favorable things to say about the game.
Which is all besides the point – the reason I play games is because they are fun. Tomb Raider was fun. If some new game comes out that happens to meet Sarkeesian’s approval and is also fun, Ill play that too.
Like I said I don’t have any issue with games striving to meet these kinds of ideals, what bothers me is the attacks on the ones that don’t.
You can’t be against censorism and support this crap…
Criticizing for abusing a stereotype. Needlessly, by the way.
That is quite untrue. Lara Croft is unrealistic oversexualised bimbo. She was drawn like that to appeal to young males. There is a lot of places where her model would fit, but she looks like a club girl not a Tomb Raider. Thing is, video games are the only ones that are sticking to those sex toy tools to make the game “better”. Again – needlessly.
So what? Why does appealing to young males (which are admittedly the games primary demographic) “oversexualised”. No, she doesn’t look like Lena Dunham, but she doesn’t look unrealistic either. Completely normal proportions, normal features, admittedly slightly-revealing-but-not-over-the-top costume.
And there is the problem: the only way this character would pass your sniff test is if she were completely unappealing to young males (which is, again, the primary demographic). But did they not make efforts to try and bridge the gap to make the game more inclusive for female players?
She is strong (but not masculine). She is self reliant. She doesn’t need men to save her. Seems like a good effort to me. But even this gets no love from the Sarkeesian crowd (even though quite a few other feminist journalist lauded it).
ps. You keep using the word “needlessly” as a placeholder for “because it sells games”. Did you notice that?
Edited 2014-11-29 01:16 UTC
And no response other than the vote hammer? Why am I not surprised…
http://www.forbes.com/sites/carolpinchefsky/2013/03/12/a-feminist-r…
http://www.themarysue.com/tomb-raider-review/
Admittedly, the opinion of a few feminist journalist doesn’t represent all feminist, but neither does Anita Sarkeesian’s opinion.
No, these developers did not set out to make the ideal game for promoting feminist ideals, but they did try to incorporate them. They listened, they got rid of the ridiculous bust line, they tried to make Laura’s character deeper, more nuanced. They avoided most (not all, but most) of the overt tropes Anita points out in her videos.
Yes, they made a game that (again, admittedly) targets young males ($$$), but while doing it they tried to make it more inclusive, particularly for women players. Its not perfect, but isn’t it better? Aren’t they doing exactly what you guys say you want?
What do they get for their trouble?
And you wonder why I’m worried?
What exactly does a Tomb Raider look like?
I can think of a fair few real female athletes who you’d probably dismiss as “unrealistic oversexualised bimbos” if they were digitised into a game.
For example, Australian hurdler Michelle Jenneke, who wouldn’t be a bad live action stand-in for the latest version of Lara Croft.
Or how about mixed martial artist Miesha Tate. Would she be too attractive and “sexualised” to be a realistic fighter, rather than a “club girl”?
Of course Lara Croft is made attractive and appealing to help sell the game, but the same is true of many male main characters. Personally I don’t see what’s so wrong with that.
Uh.. what? WTF are you talking about? She’s a girl, yes. In what way is that oversexualizing? Because she’s not a male? Can you explain what you are trying to say please?
Out of curiosity, how many real life “tomb raiders” have you ever met. And what do they actually look like?
Those who are easily offended, and are willing to impose their own moral standards/expectations onto others, do not seem to understand that; a) Morality is relative, and b) Significant portions of the human population do not share your inability to distinguish the clear differences between fiction/art/fantasy and the actual/real/physical world.
You do realize that she also has problems with Mario games…
Please be warned that this is my PERSONAL option.
First video on youtube, I’ve watched and tought “oh yeah, this is absolutely true, great video!”.
Then I watched the second one, and she was just bending the reality to keep the point she already had gained. I tougth she would be forgotten and a new feminist leadership in games, less feminazi (based on second video, yes, I think she is one of those) with better better ideas like Emma Watson did in her brilliant feminist speech on UN, would arise and take her place.
But then a bunch of jerks started attacking her, and sudenly a bad example of feminism, that I think Sarkeesian is, just became a pop-star. Meanwhile real feminism that is equal rights not attacking a guys shirt, lost its place. A shame.
Edited 2014-11-27 11:25 UTC
What about the gays? Do we have enough manlove in our current games? Is the love between two persons of the same sex being promoted enough?
What about the black people?
What about persons with dissabilities? Do we have enough good guys in wheelchairs chasing aliens in tropical rainforests or not?
And more proof you have no idea what you are talking about.
The answers to all of your questions is yes, it’d be great if there was more attention to all those groups. And in fact, that’s exactly what these people are arguing for.
Well, I know of one game where you play a guy in a wheelchair. It’s an Occulus Rift game and it makes perfect sense. You sit in front of your computer (=> sitting in a wheelchair) but you can look around you using the rift. But it’s only one game.
How about we start with proper representation of females. Not your Playboy definition of females, but actual females.
Take Game of Thrones. Has a lot of violence and yet manages to provide exceptionally wide palette of characters. From damsels in distress to whores to strong women.
An interesting example for you to use considering the number of feminists who’ve complained about the depiction/objectification of women, and the violence against women, seen in Game of Thrones.
I’ve seen a fair few feminists accuse Martin of misogyny for writing it, and dismiss the show’s male fans as only tuning in for a fix of violence and T&A. It has even been accused of being pro-rape, and guilty of glamorising and encouraging violence against women.
Of course those arguments against GOT are about as balanced, unbiased, and solidly evidence based as Sarkeesian’s criticism of games like GTA and Hitman…
Are you a feminist game developer? Fine. Make your feminist games for your feminist audience and don’t whine and demand that others do the same.
Is that all you can muster? You can’t do anything other than whine like a baby here? The point isn’t that every game should cater to feminists and that there should not be anything else. The point is that developers should evaluate whether they should pay a little bit more attention to the presentation and depth of their characters and events.
I mean, it’s not even a demand that *every* game should add those things, it’s just a demand that developers should think about it more. If they still felt that they’re in a good position and they have all the depth they want, then good, continue as-is.
Would it really be so god damn horrible if there was a bit more depth added to in-game characters? Or that some common stereotypes were reworked during development? Where’s the negative sides to that?
I think the problem is that one group of “feminists” alienate another group of feminists. In my country, feminists fight against the burqa, they want freedom. They like being free to wear miniskirts. Contraception was a huge victory for them. On the other side, you have “feminists” who complain about breasts and skin displayed and hate prostitutes.
And complaining about GTA is not helping anybody. The guy spending all his day hijacking cars, running over pedestrians, killing police officers, selling hard drugs and what not and the complain is about sex and woman depiction in the game. WTF?
I mostly agree. I consider real feminists those that in the old ages fought for women to have the right to vote, or to go and have a job and earn their own money instead of being forced to rely on a man for their living. These days, at least in Europe and the U.S., it seems that those who call themselves as feminists are more about misandry than women’s rights. That’s totally despicable.
In Finland maybe, but not the rest of Europe. The self-identified feminists I know both in Norway and the UK tend to campaign on issues like systematic rapes in warzones, domestic violence, trafficking, revenge porn, negative stereotypes, and that sort of thing. There is definitely misandry out there in feminist circles, but statements like “those who call themselves as feminists are more about misandry than women’s rights” suggest that there is nothing worthwhile being done by feminists, which is simply not true.
For the record, I am a middle-aged man.
Didn’t you know? You can blow peoples’ heads off and pump them full of lead until your thumbs get sore, but better not beat up a hooker in the process.
When some nimrod starts going on about sexism in video games, I always say, ‘Sure, we can get rid of the sexism. But let’s also get rid of the graphic violence too, okay?’ That usually shuts them up pretty quickly
Well… I’ll bring up Game of Thrones to shut you up. Not a game, but mixes both graphic violence with good depiction of women.
Wow. Way to miss the point…
His point was objecting to violence in games is absolutely no different than objecting to sexism in video games.
Its always like this when it starts. Some group sees the world a certain way, thinks everyone obviously should see it the way they do (because, you know, think of the children!), and then proceeds to take a seemingly logical self-righteous stand against those that don’t.
Except in this case its “think of the women” instead. And the same exact counter argument applies. If you don’t want your kids playing violent games don’t let them. Except women are all grown up, they don’t need you to tell them that they probably won’t like Saints Row 4 – its not really made with them in mind…
Putting aside all the #GamerGate crap, the threats, the yelling back and forth and what not, and the argument about what her actual goals were when Sarkeesian made her videos – this whole thing can be boiled down to a single question?
Does sexism/violence/whatever in video games negatively alter people’s behavior in real life, or doesn’t it?
You believe it does. I don’t. You can pull out studies supporting your point of view. So can I. But at the end of the day what I want is to let developers do whatever they want to creatively. More options are good. Games targeting narrow demographics are good. I don’t want my entertainment homogenized for the sake of feminism.
I don’t have a problem with a game having a “good depiction of women” (hell, I LOVE GoT – give me a game like that!). Thing is I also have no problem with a game having a “bad depiction of women” – but seemingly you and Sarkeesian do.
So don’t buy them. If enough people don’t buy them they won’t get made anymore. But framing it as “harmful” is just a ploy to tip the scales in your favor – it just stirs up the masses and pisses people off. Its not harmful, you just don’t like it.
Fair enough, go make games you do like. Make them better than other games. If they are actually really good all the unenlightened misogynists will like them too. Then you win.
All without this senseless internet-wide flame war. How about that…?
Spending effort and time on useless fluff that customers don’t care about.
Better use it for fixing bugs before release.
This post in reaction makes a lot more sense to me:
http://www.breitbart.com/Breitbart-London/2014/11/27/An-open-letter…
Death threats? Seriously?
http://www.breitbart.com/Breitbart-London/2014/11/27/An-open-letter…
Hagiography is not journalism. This response goes point by point and is worth the read (and the cited links and embeds).
… as long as they keep the umbrella girls in motorsport, I have no complaints.
It’s mind boggling to me that obviously intelligent people can be taken in by a character like Anita Sarkeesian.
How people can’t see through her blatantly dishonest misrepresentation of games, puritanical scaremongering, and utterly dogmatic and biased arguments, is truly beyond me.
It’s not like someone stirring up and manipulating a moral panic is anything new. I’m old enough to remember British video stores being raided because of Mary Whitehouse’s campaign against the “video nasties” that were supposedly corrupting the nations children. Just in the last few years, similar arguments about the dangers of the internet have been used to push for mandatory filtering and censorship, often by politicians trying to make a name for themselves.
Look back and there are plenty of past panics about gaming (of one kind or another), from Dungeons and Dragons (anyone remember Tom Hanks driven RPG crazy in Mazes and Monsters?), to people in the 1950s smashing pinball machines because of their bad influence on teens. And of course there’s been constant pearl clutching over video games, from Death Race in the 70s, to Barbarian in the 80s, to Mortal Kombat in the 90s, and so on.
Anita Sarkeesian is simply the latest self-selected moral guardian to jump on the bandwagon, albeit one with a slightly different schtick. A schtick that better appeals to “progressives” than the equally vacuous arguments from the religious right.
That doesn’t mean that Sarkeesian deserves harassment or threats, any more than Christian televangelists deserve that treatment when they preach about Harry Potter encouraging Satanism. What she does deserve is all the mockery and contempt she receives; taking her seriously gives her pseudo-intellectual drivel far too much credit.
If people want a certain type of game, they will pay for a certain type of game to be made. If not, then they won’t. I think the best way to get your game type made is to crowdfund and get in the news for doing so.
Star Citizen was a genre that noone was interested in making as a corporate product. Rather than complain or lobby EA to make another Wing Commander game. Chris Roberts went directly to the consumers and floated his game ideas. It turned out that people wanted to buy it.
Surely it’s not that hard to run a funding campaign over 6 months, spamming up facebook and other services. If you want to make something, go out and make it. EA/Activision etc have focus groups and marketing and research they actively pursue to make games. These companies look at market trends to make decisions.
People lobbied for Linux games for years with no success. If you want people to take you seriously you need cold hard numbers. Start a humble bundle equivalent and keep stats of who’s buying the games that you’re trying to sell. Publish those results accurately and in a testable way and your obscure game type can also have commercial success and be made by big companies.
Thom,
I am logging in for the first time in *years* just to say that I’m honestly disappointed you are taking Anita Sarkeesian seriously. That woman is a fraud.
Nobody deserves death threats. But I do think valid criticism against her shallow opinions are warranted.
Edited 2014-11-29 22:16 UTC
I wouldn’t have so much problem with feminism as a point of view if it was at least a clear one. But it isn’t. Feminist violently disagree what kind of freedom an emancipated woman should have. Should a woman embraise her femininity, showing of her busom, curves and her sexually ripe self in pride, or should she dress herself up, showing as little to the lewd males as possible. Or should she be able to choose herself. There seems to be no agreement here. Should a woman do this or should she do that? Is sexuallity OK or not? Freedom to choose or freedom from praying eyes? You get the point.
That is why, I think, most feminists focus on what _not_ to do, because they can’t really agree on what _to_ do. And that can only take you so far before reaching a dead end.
You want more feminism in games? Well, what would that look like? Please tell me that so I can take a viewpoint against what we already have.
Add then the usual need for attention, which in todays hypercharged information flow disappears unless you can show something really chocking. I believe that if Sarkeesian didn’t make a huge deal about her death threats (regardless what you think about that) few would have given her work much attention. She wants, for whatever reason, attention and this way she is getting it.
If it really makes the gaming industry a less sexist place, I think we are moving slowly towards that even without her critizism, valid or not.