TNC has a point about socially progressive games selling poorly, but games featuring women get around half the marketing dollars of games featuring men
Honestly I feel Jimquisition covers these issues better than Anita on a "how does the industry fix the problems" level
My position on these videos has pretty much always been what @Arch posted on the first page of this thread (plus a dash of "I find her delivery sort of boring and prefer to read the transcript") and I'm really not sure what there is to discuss about these videos. The points are anodyne except to the deplorably massive portion of the world that disagrees with her, with varying degrees of vehemence and with predictably awful consequences for women and society at large, so except to the extent that we enjoy playing "argue against skfm, J, and TNC for eternity" I'm not sure what we can get out of a discussion of the videos.
Even the point in the OP ('it would be good if she addressed counterexamples') isn't much to go on, since as @Blackjack pointed out, those are coming in the next video.
I guess we could go over the stuff that makes her points anodyne, the stuff that she regrettably fails to even mention let alone attempt to cite in any organized manner, but then this would just be a feminism 101 thread, yes? I'm glad the videos exist insofar as they are great awareness raisers, and Sarkeesian's noble endurance of hundreds (thousands?) of death threats, rape threats, and so on is (weirdly and sadly) one of the most interesting things to come from the whole process, but... there's just not a lot to talk about in the videos themselves.
As other people have already said, her videos themselves are basically pop feminism. They are not particularly deep or insightful, and don't engage in any meaningful way with the wealth of existing feminist theory.
But hey, we could always use more agitators. Things are already getting better- the indie game scene and the Twine scene in particular are constantly putting out progressively-minded games dealing with a variety of social issues, and those games which are actually good are starting to get mainsteam video game press attention as well.
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
Wow. I just skimmed the first transcript, and don't even know what to say. Yes, lots of women in games need to be rescued, but that's just because the protagonists are male.
They sure are.
That is a totally different issue though, and it isn't about sexism, its about sales. She is taking a pure dollars and cents decision (mostly straight male protagonists) and claimed that a consequence of that decision (the people these characters care about saving are often female love interests) is some special form of prevalent sexism. That's a bad faith argument.
Edit: also, why no Kreia? Why no Celes? Because they are strong women you rescue, and that doesn't fit the story she wants to tell.
Two things- one, most people would benefit from reading her Kickstarter page. She has left out positive examples in these videos because that is one of the later videos she has planned.
To respond to this post- we have already had the "sales and marketing can be sexist" discussion a thousand times before, and it is as tedious as the first time.
Sales numbers do not excuse sexism.
But she is talkin about damsels in distress. Not mentioning he cases that go against type makes her seem like she is arguing in bad faith. Best case, the last video redeems her, but until that point she looks bad. But I think its more likely that she won't do strong women in each trope, and that seems like bad faith.
You can't just hand wave the money away. It gets mentioned every time because it is the whole point. Of course there are tons of games where a man rescues a women, because games with male protagonists tend to sell better and rescuing a loved one is an easy motivation. Not acknowledge this and making it out like the whole issue is just that developers choose this story with no constraints is absurd. They are already starting with the constraint of having a straight male protagonist who needs a motivation!
Fuck sakes.
The money isn't being hand waved. The purpose of this undertaking is to change the minds of the people spending it.
Did you read the post you are responding to? I am saying that the whole premise of her argument is wrong, because she is ignoring the fact that developers are starting from a position of straight male protagonists for financial reasons. That is why the trope of rescuing women is so common, IMO. That isn't sexist.
Wow. I just skimmed the first transcript, and don't even know what to say. Yes, lots of women in games need to be rescued, but that's just because the protagonists are male.
They sure are.
That is a totally different issue though, and it isn't about sexism, its about sales. She is taking a pure dollars and cents decision (mostly straight male protagonists) and claimed that a consequence of that decision (the people these characters care about saving are often female love interests) is some special form of prevalent sexism. That's a bad faith argument.
Edit: also, why no Kreia? Why no Celes? Because they are strong women you rescue, and that doesn't fit the story she wants to tell.
Two things- one, most people would benefit from reading her Kickstarter page. She has left out positive examples in these videos because that is one of the later videos she has planned.
To respond to this post- we have already had the "sales and marketing can be sexist" discussion a thousand times before, and it is as tedious as the first time.
Sales numbers do not excuse sexism.
But she is talkin about damsels in distress. Not mentioning he cases that go against type makes her seem like she is arguing in bad faith. Best case, the last video redeems her, but until that point she looks bad. But I think its more likely that she won't do strong women in each trope, and that seems like bad faith.
You can't just hand wave the money away. It gets mentioned every time because it is the whole point. Of course there are tons of games where a man rescues a women, because games with male protagonists tend to sell better and rescuing a loved one is an easy motivation. Not acknowledge this and making it out like the whole issue is just that developers choose this story with no constraints is absurd. They are already starting with the constraint of having a straight male protagonist who needs a motivation!
Fuck sakes.
The money isn't being hand waved. The purpose of this undertaking is to change the minds of the people spending it.
Did you read the post you are responding to? I am saying that the whole premise of her argument is wrong, because she is ignoring the fact that developers are starting from a position of straight male protagonists for financial reasons. That is why the trope of rescuing women is so common, IMO. That isn't sexist.
Are you saying that financially-motivated decisions can't be sexist?
Well that's a pretty silly place to go, video games are created by and large by corporations to create a profit
so if a sexist attitude will get them more money that's what they're going to do
I don't agree with that assessment, Tomb Raider did pretty good for example (despite their hilarious sales predictions), and games like Medal of Honor do poorly - targeting the dudebro demographic only yields so much.
I also disagree it's necessary to be either lazy or sexist. The argument can be made that a game from a developer under EA has to have a male lead walking towards the camera with an orange glow because the publisher wants them to. There is no realistic justification for why Zelda and Mario have to keep using women as a thing to be rescued beyond "they've always done it that way". They won't lose sales if they go in a difff.f.. oh right Wind Waker
Nevermind, consumers suck
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
Wow. I just skimmed the first transcript, and don't even know what to say. Yes, lots of women in games need to be rescued, but that's just because the protagonists are male.
They sure are.
That is a totally different issue though, and it isn't about sexism, its about sales. She is taking a pure dollars and cents decision (mostly straight male protagonists) and claimed that a consequence of that decision (the people these characters care about saving are often female love interests) is some special form of prevalent sexism. That's a bad faith argument.
Edit: also, why no Kreia? Why no Celes? Because they are strong women you rescue, and that doesn't fit the story she wants to tell.
Two things- one, most people would benefit from reading her Kickstarter page. She has left out positive examples in these videos because that is one of the later videos she has planned.
To respond to this post- we have already had the "sales and marketing can be sexist" discussion a thousand times before, and it is as tedious as the first time.
Sales numbers do not excuse sexism.
But she is talkin about damsels in distress. Not mentioning he cases that go against type makes her seem like she is arguing in bad faith. Best case, the last video redeems her, but until that point she looks bad. But I think its more likely that she won't do strong women in each trope, and that seems like bad faith.
You can't just hand wave the money away. It gets mentioned every time because it is the whole point. Of course there are tons of games where a man rescues a women, because games with male protagonists tend to sell better and rescuing a loved one is an easy motivation. Not acknowledge this and making it out like the whole issue is just that developers choose this story with no constraints is absurd. They are already starting with the constraint of having a straight male protagonist who needs a motivation!
Fuck sakes.
The money isn't being hand waved. The purpose of this undertaking is to change the minds of the people spending it.
Did you read the post you are responding to? I am saying that the whole premise of her argument is wrong, because she is ignoring the fact that developers are starting from a position of straight male protagonists for financial reasons. That is why the trope of rescuing women is so common, IMO. That isn't sexist.
Are you saying that financially-motivated decisions can't be sexist?
If they do it for financial reasons, then the intent is to make money, not to keep those icky women out of games though. . .
Well that's a pretty silly place to go, video games are created by and large by corporations to create a profit
so if a sexist attitude will get them more money that's what they're going to do
I don't agree with that assessment, Tomb Raider did pretty good for example (despite their hilarious sales predictions), and games like Medal of Honor do poorly - targeting the dudebro demographic only yields so much.
I also disagree it's necessary to be either lazy or sexist. The argument can be made that a game from a developer under EA has to have a male lead walking towards the camera with an orange glow because the publisher wants them to. There is no realistic justification for why Zelda and Mario have to keep using women as a thing to be rescued beyond "they've always done it that way". They won't lose sales if they go in a difff.f.. oh right Wind Waker
Nevermind, consumers suck
Why should Mario or Zelda change? They have winning formulas that people love. Metroid already has a female protagonist.
New IP is always preferred over restructuring old IP; the con being that it happens slower
Marty: The future, it's where you're going? Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
If they do it for financial reasons, then the intent is to make money, not to keep those icky women out of games though. . .
Sexism is not necessarily a conscious intent though, but an unconscious state of being. The school of Marxist feminism would argue that capitalism is inherently sexist because it is dominated by men.
Wow. I just skimmed the first transcript, and don't even know what to say. Yes, lots of women in games need to be rescued, but that's just because the protagonists are male.
They sure are.
That is a totally different issue though, and it isn't about sexism, its about sales. She is taking a pure dollars and cents decision (mostly straight male protagonists) and claimed that a consequence of that decision (the people these characters care about saving are often female love interests) is some special form of prevalent sexism. That's a bad faith argument.
Edit: also, why no Kreia? Why no Celes? Because they are strong women you rescue, and that doesn't fit the story she wants to tell.
Two things- one, most people would benefit from reading her Kickstarter page. She has left out positive examples in these videos because that is one of the later videos she has planned.
To respond to this post- we have already had the "sales and marketing can be sexist" discussion a thousand times before, and it is as tedious as the first time.
Sales numbers do not excuse sexism.
But she is talkin about damsels in distress. Not mentioning he cases that go against type makes her seem like she is arguing in bad faith. Best case, the last video redeems her, but until that point she looks bad. But I think its more likely that she won't do strong women in each trope, and that seems like bad faith.
You can't just hand wave the money away. It gets mentioned every time because it is the whole point. Of course there are tons of games where a man rescues a women, because games with male protagonists tend to sell better and rescuing a loved one is an easy motivation. Not acknowledge this and making it out like the whole issue is just that developers choose this story with no constraints is absurd. They are already starting with the constraint of having a straight male protagonist who needs a motivation!
Fuck sakes.
The money isn't being hand waved. The purpose of this undertaking is to change the minds of the people spending it.
Did you read the post you are responding to? I am saying that the whole premise of her argument is wrong, because she is ignoring the fact that developers are starting from a position of straight male protagonists for financial reasons. That is why the trope of rescuing women is so common, IMO. That isn't sexist.
Having a straight dude as your protagonist isn't sexist, or homophobic, or racist (because let's be real here, that straight dude is also white). No one is actually arguing otherwise. The erasure and reduction of minority characters may not by -ist, either in fact. But it sure as hell can be (hated word incoming!) problematic.
If they do it for financial reasons, then the intent is to make money, not to keep those icky women out of games though. . .
Sexism is not necessarily a conscious intent though, but an unconscious state of being. The school of Marxist feminism would argue that capitalism is inherently sexist because it is dominated by men.
currently, not inherently. And it's called Marxist because the solution is also a redistribution of wealth.
Marty: The future, it's where you're going? Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
Wow. I just skimmed the first transcript, and don't even know what to say. Yes, lots of women in games need to be rescued, but that's just because the protagonists are male.
They sure are.
That is a totally different issue though, and it isn't about sexism, its about sales. She is taking a pure dollars and cents decision (mostly straight male protagonists) and claimed that a consequence of that decision (the people these characters care about saving are often female love interests) is some special form of prevalent sexism. That's a bad faith argument.
Edit: also, why no Kreia? Why no Celes? Because they are strong women you rescue, and that doesn't fit the story she wants to tell.
Two things- one, most people would benefit from reading her Kickstarter page. She has left out positive examples in these videos because that is one of the later videos she has planned.
To respond to this post- we have already had the "sales and marketing can be sexist" discussion a thousand times before, and it is as tedious as the first time.
Sales numbers do not excuse sexism.
But she is talkin about damsels in distress. Not mentioning he cases that go against type makes her seem like she is arguing in bad faith. Best case, the last video redeems her, but until that point she looks bad. But I think its more likely that she won't do strong women in each trope, and that seems like bad faith.
You can't just hand wave the money away. It gets mentioned every time because it is the whole point. Of course there are tons of games where a man rescues a women, because games with male protagonists tend to sell better and rescuing a loved one is an easy motivation. Not acknowledge this and making it out like the whole issue is just that developers choose this story with no constraints is absurd. They are already starting with the constraint of having a straight male protagonist who needs a motivation!
Fuck sakes.
The money isn't being hand waved. The purpose of this undertaking is to change the minds of the people spending it.
Did you read the post you are responding to? I am saying that the whole premise of her argument is wrong, because she is ignoring the fact that developers are starting from a position of straight male protagonists for financial reasons. That is why the trope of rescuing women is so common, IMO. That isn't sexist.
Are you saying that financially-motivated decisions can't be sexist?
If they do it for financial reasons, then the intent is to make money, not to keep those icky women out of games though. . .
.
It can still be de facto sexist. Basically maybe we can argue for sexism like you can for negligent homicide. The intent to kill is not there, but the person takes actions that end up causing a wrongful death due to a failure to cover the forseeable results of their actions the way a reasonable person would.
So the intent to be sexist is not there, but the company in the search for profits creates a product which any reasonable person would take a look at and say "Hey we can't ship this, its a sexist piece of crap"
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
If they do it for financial reasons, then the intent is to make money, not to keep those icky women out of games though. . .
Sexism is not necessarily a conscious intent though, but an unconscious state of being. The school of Marxist feminism would argue that capitalism is inherently sexist because it is dominated by men.
Is this really what we are talking about now? This is the kind of thing that makes people hate/not respect feminism.
Instead of hoping EA will decide to care about your social views over its own profits, why not focus on personally trying to change things by buying games that do feature women, and trying to appeal to indie developers who are looking for a niche?
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
Wow. I just skimmed the first transcript, and don't even know what to say. Yes, lots of women in games need to be rescued, but that's just because the protagonists are male.
They sure are.
That is a totally different issue though, and it isn't about sexism, its about sales. She is taking a pure dollars and cents decision (mostly straight male protagonists) and claimed that a consequence of that decision (the people these characters care about saving are often female love interests) is some special form of prevalent sexism. That's a bad faith argument.
Edit: also, why no Kreia? Why no Celes? Because they are strong women you rescue, and that doesn't fit the story she wants to tell.
Two things- one, most people would benefit from reading her Kickstarter page. She has left out positive examples in these videos because that is one of the later videos she has planned.
To respond to this post- we have already had the "sales and marketing can be sexist" discussion a thousand times before, and it is as tedious as the first time.
Sales numbers do not excuse sexism.
But she is talkin about damsels in distress. Not mentioning he cases that go against type makes her seem like she is arguing in bad faith. Best case, the last video redeems her, but until that point she looks bad. But I think its more likely that she won't do strong women in each trope, and that seems like bad faith.
You can't just hand wave the money away. It gets mentioned every time because it is the whole point. Of course there are tons of games where a man rescues a women, because games with male protagonists tend to sell better and rescuing a loved one is an easy motivation. Not acknowledge this and making it out like the whole issue is just that developers choose this story with no constraints is absurd. They are already starting with the constraint of having a straight male protagonist who needs a motivation!
Fuck sakes.
The money isn't being hand waved. The purpose of this undertaking is to change the minds of the people spending it.
Did you read the post you are responding to? I am saying that the whole premise of her argument is wrong, because she is ignoring the fact that developers are starting from a position of straight male protagonists for financial reasons. That is why the trope of rescuing women is so common, IMO. That isn't sexist.
Having a straight dude as your protagonist isn't sexist, or homophobic, or racist (because let's be real here, that straight dude is also white). No one is actually arguing otherwise. The erasure and reduction of minority characters may not by -ist, either in fact. But it sure as hell can be (hated word incoming!) problematic.
But it's a different problem than claiming women are made weak macguffins in games because sexism. If she wants to say women are rarely protagonists, you'll get no argument from me.
If they do it for financial reasons, then the intent is to make money, not to keep those icky women out of games though. . .
Sexism is not necessarily a conscious intent though, but an unconscious state of being. The school of Marxist feminism would argue that capitalism is inherently sexist because it is dominated by men.
Is this really what we are talking about now? This is the kind of thing that makes people hate/not respect feminism.
Instead of hoping EA will decide to care about your social views over its own profits, why not focus on personally trying to change things by buying games that do feature women, and trying to appeal to indie developers who are looking for a niche?
Or, you know, put out a series of videos that attempts to educate gamers about the existence and harm of sexism in games.
If they do it for financial reasons, then the intent is to make money, not to keep those icky women out of games though. . .
Sexism is not necessarily a conscious intent though, but an unconscious state of being. The school of Marxist feminism would argue that capitalism is inherently sexist because it is dominated by men.
Is this really what we are talking about now? This is the kind of thing that makes people hate/not respect feminism.
Instead of hoping EA will decide to care about your social views over its own profits, why not focus on personally trying to change things by buying games that do feature women, and trying to appeal to indie developers who are looking for a niche?
Does anybody remember wanting to purchase Galactic Civilizations II?
Marty: The future, it's where you're going? Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
If they do it for financial reasons, then the intent is to make money, not to keep those icky women out of games though. . .
Sexism is not necessarily a conscious intent though, but an unconscious state of being. The school of Marxist feminism would argue that capitalism is inherently sexist because it is dominated by men.
Is this really what we are talking about now? This is the kind of thing that makes people hate/not respect feminism.
Instead of hoping EA will decide to care about your social views over its own profits, why not focus on personally trying to change things by buying games that do feature women, and trying to appeal to indie developers who are looking for a niche?
Or, you know, put out a series of videos that attempts to educate gamers about the existence and harm of sexism in games.
That doesn't help! Because something something capitalism!
How about this: the sexist part isn't trying to make the most money. It's ignoring the entire female consumer base. They say "bro shooters make money, and bros are the best consumers, so we will target them." But women are 50% of the population and basically have the same spending power as men, so if bro shooters aren't hitting that demo at all, maybe there's some uber genre out there for those consumers that would hit similar penetration? I suppose you could equally call this "stupidity" or "weak understanding of demographics" but combined with other issues it can be very much sexist.
Your premise is "they are trying to make the most money" but the answer is "they are not even doing a very good job of that." Medal of Honor Warfighter was a huge fail that crushed the studio. Tomb Raider (probably the most progressive game in the series for the most part) was easily the best selling in the series. Mirror's Edge didn't sell the best, but... compared to what? Call of Duty? Why would you compare every segment of the market to the most successful one? This is the sort of thinking that led to the crash of the American car industry...
That's just CEOs and marketing teams being extremely dumb
Marty: The future, it's where you're going? Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
If they do it for financial reasons, then the intent is to make money, not to keep those icky women out of games though. . .
Sexism is not necessarily a conscious intent though, but an unconscious state of being. The school of Marxist feminism would argue that capitalism is inherently sexist because it is dominated by men.
Is this really what we are talking about now? This is the kind of thing that makes people hate/not respect feminism.
Instead of hoping EA will decide to care about your social views over its own profits, why not focus on personally trying to change things by buying games that do feature women, and trying to appeal to indie developers who are looking for a niche?
Not sure what you mean with your first two sentences (Marxism and feminism have enough in common that it makes sense that there would be study devoted to the overlap) but as to your second paragraph- why can't you do both? Support progressive games AND criticize regressive games.
My point was just that sexism (and any other form of bigotry, really) isn't necessarily a conscious personal decision, but a systematic undercurrent of society.
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
If they do it for financial reasons, then the intent is to make money, not to keep those icky women out of games though. . .
Sexism is not necessarily a conscious intent though, but an unconscious state of being. The school of Marxist feminism would argue that capitalism is inherently sexist because it is dominated by men.
Is this really what we are talking about now? This is the kind of thing that makes people hate/not respect feminism.
Instead of hoping EA will decide to care about your social views over its own profits, why not focus on personally trying to change things by buying games that do feature women, and trying to appeal to indie developers who are looking for a niche?
Or, you know, put out a series of videos that attempts to educate gamers about the existence and harm of sexism in games.
But the entire premise of these first two videos is flawed at best. . . And even if they were perfect, the meaningful action is in supporting games that are less sexist. Like I always say In these threads, its better to support the people doing things you like than to just focus on tearing down those you don't.
That's just CEOs and marketing teams being extremely dumb
Right, but they're being dumb in a way that's inequally targeted and (blah blah blah, you know what I'm talking about).
Responding to a thought from earlier on, Feminism 101 stuff is rather important to keep putting out there, I'd say. I would have been one of those guys refusing to engage with the ideas presented here at all (and believing myself the wiser for it), had I not been patiently taught the error of my ways during RA training with material not dissimilar to her videos.
If they do it for financial reasons, then the intent is to make money, not to keep those icky women out of games though. . .
Sexism is not necessarily a conscious intent though, but an unconscious state of being. The school of Marxist feminism would argue that capitalism is inherently sexist because it is dominated by men.
Is this really what we are talking about now? This is the kind of thing that makes people hate/not respect feminism.
Instead of hoping EA will decide to care about your social views over its own profits, why not focus on personally trying to change things by buying games that do feature women, and trying to appeal to indie developers who are looking for a niche?
Or, you know, put out a series of videos that attempts to educate gamers about the existence and harm of sexism in games.
But the entire premise of these first two videos is flawed at best. . . And even if they were perfect, the meaningful action is in supporting games that are less sexist. Like I always say In these threads, its better to support the people doing things you like than to just focus on tearing down those you don't.
I know, and you never seem to support that assertion with any sort of evidence, and you always seem to ignore that fact that the two aren't mutually exclusive.
They moistly come out at night, moistly.
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
If they do it for financial reasons, then the intent is to make money, not to keep those icky women out of games though. . .
Sexism is not necessarily a conscious intent though, but an unconscious state of being. The school of Marxist feminism would argue that capitalism is inherently sexist because it is dominated by men.
Is this really what we are talking about now? This is the kind of thing that makes people hate/not respect feminism.
Instead of hoping EA will decide to care about your social views over its own profits, why not focus on personally trying to change things by buying games that do feature women, and trying to appeal to indie developers who are looking for a niche?
Not sure what you mean with your first two sentences (Marxism and feminism have enough in common that it makes sense that there would be study devoted to the overlap) but as to your second paragraph- why can't you do both? Support progressive games AND criticize regressive games.
My point was just that sexism (and any other form of bigotry, really) isn't necessarily a conscious personal decision, but a systematic undercurrent of society.
Just because men succeed more than women under capitalism doesn't make it sexist, and when you start using feminism to critique our whole society instead of pieces of it, you lose me, at least. We want more games to have girls? Fine, we can work on that in a productive fashion. Wanting to tear down capitalism and/or redefine success because right now more men are doing well? That is such a big goal that you might as well push to replace cars with unicorns. Change within the system is reasonable. Change that requires discarding the system is nearly impossible (even if it were desirable) and so it isn't even practical to discuss it.
If they do it for financial reasons, then the intent is to make money, not to keep those icky women out of games though. . .
Sexism is not necessarily a conscious intent though, but an unconscious state of being. The school of Marxist feminism would argue that capitalism is inherently sexist because it is dominated by men.
Is this really what we are talking about now? This is the kind of thing that makes people hate/not respect feminism.
Instead of hoping EA will decide to care about your social views over its own profits, why not focus on personally trying to change things by buying games that do feature women, and trying to appeal to indie developers who are looking for a niche?
Not sure what you mean with your first two sentences (Marxism and feminism have enough in common that it makes sense that there would be study devoted to the overlap) but as to your second paragraph- why can't you do both? Support progressive games AND criticize regressive games.
My point was just that sexism (and any other form of bigotry, really) isn't necessarily a conscious personal decision, but a systematic undercurrent of society.
Just because men succeed more than women under capitalism doesn't make it sexist, and when you start using feminism to critique our whole society instead of pieces of it, you lose me, at least. We want more games to have girls? Fine, we can work on that in a productive fashion. Wanting to tear down capitalism and/or redefine success because right now more men are doing well? That is such a big goal that you might as well push to replace cars with unicorns. Change within the system is reasonable. Change that requires discarding the system is nearly impossible (even if it were desirable) and so it isn't even practical to discuss it.
Please tell me what aspects of society are not affected by sexism.
If they do it for financial reasons, then the intent is to make money, not to keep those icky women out of games though. . .
Sexism is not necessarily a conscious intent though, but an unconscious state of being. The school of Marxist feminism would argue that capitalism is inherently sexist because it is dominated by men.
Is this really what we are talking about now? This is the kind of thing that makes people hate/not respect feminism.
Instead of hoping EA will decide to care about your social views over its own profits, why not focus on personally trying to change things by buying games that do feature women, and trying to appeal to indie developers who are looking for a niche?
Or, you know, put out a series of videos that attempts to educate gamers about the existence and harm of sexism in games.
Because I cant buy an anti-game. This was the point I was trying to make with the Bitch magazine's gaming tag list. If in 3 years you mention one game in a I played this game heres a review sense and the rest of your coverage is the standard litany of feminist media criticism 101, how is that going to influence a market towards serving you. Were there no gender neutral games in the last 3 years?
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
If they do it for financial reasons, then the intent is to make money, not to keep those icky women out of games though. . .
Sexism is not necessarily a conscious intent though, but an unconscious state of being. The school of Marxist feminism would argue that capitalism is inherently sexist because it is dominated by men.
Is this really what we are talking about now? This is the kind of thing that makes people hate/not respect feminism.
Instead of hoping EA will decide to care about your social views over its own profits, why not focus on personally trying to change things by buying games that do feature women, and trying to appeal to indie developers who are looking for a niche?
Not sure what you mean with your first two sentences (Marxism and feminism have enough in common that it makes sense that there would be study devoted to the overlap) but as to your second paragraph- why can't you do both? Support progressive games AND criticize regressive games.
My point was just that sexism (and any other form of bigotry, really) isn't necessarily a conscious personal decision, but a systematic undercurrent of society.
Just because men succeed more than women under capitalism doesn't make it sexist, and when you start using feminism to critique our whole society instead of pieces of it, you lose me, at least. We want more games to have girls? Fine, we can work on that in a productive fashion. Wanting to tear down capitalism and/or redefine success because right now more men are doing well? That is such a big goal that you might as well push to replace cars with unicorns. Change within the system is reasonable. Change that requires discarding the system is nearly impossible (even if it were desirable) and so it isn't even practical to discuss it.
Please tell me what aspects of society are not affected by sexism.
Is it sexist to reward people who are more aggressive and assertive instead of the people who focus more on collaboration but don't put themselves front and center? The former is viewed as make behavior, but plenty of women engage in it and succeed. I would say that isn't sexist. It's just reasonable that people who act in that way find more personal success. If you want to challenge things like that, then what you are calling sexism is so incredibly broad that I cannot even agree that it is a bad thing.
But the entire premise of these first two videos is flawed at best. . . And even if they were perfect, the meaningful action is in supporting games that are less sexist. Like I always say In these threads, its better to support the people doing things you like than to just focus on tearing down those you don't.
Jim Sterling had a really good video about how complaining about problems in gaming has had a MUCH more powerful effect than any sort of "boycott" or "economic protest." And there's a lot of reasons for that. For one thing, a favorite argument of any defender of any material thing is "how do you know it's bad, you haven't even tried it!" And then people who buy it chime it that "no, it really was bad actually" and then the goalposts are quickly moved to "well, they got your money anyway, chump, they don't care what you think."
Second point along this line, buying something ISN'T showing any kind of opinion. I could be buying it because I'm bored or because it was cheap or because my friends pressured me into it or I just like shooters or whatever. How do the creators know that the social justice part is the part I liked? Well, I guess I could engage in critical analysis and TALK about it, but there you go again trying to say that buying is super superior to talking about it.
Another thing in the whole "buy it or don't", what if I buy it and I'm disappointed in the content? Like it made a bad argument or whatever and now I start spreading bad word of mouth? In your model, I'm really a supporter, because I bought it.
Next up, what if NO games are sufficiently positive? The only way you'd get there is through criticism like this. I can't support something that doesn't exist, but I CAN strongly state my preference for thing X.
To be clear, I'm not saying economic support is useless or that idle chatter is the most powerful force in the universe, just that this "buy it or don't" argument is INCREDIBLY lame.
If they do it for financial reasons, then the intent is to make money, not to keep those icky women out of games though. . .
Sexism is not necessarily a conscious intent though, but an unconscious state of being. The school of Marxist feminism would argue that capitalism is inherently sexist because it is dominated by men.
Is this really what we are talking about now? This is the kind of thing that makes people hate/not respect feminism.
Instead of hoping EA will decide to care about your social views over its own profits, why not focus on personally trying to change things by buying games that do feature women, and trying to appeal to indie developers who are looking for a niche?
Not sure what you mean with your first two sentences (Marxism and feminism have enough in common that it makes sense that there would be study devoted to the overlap) but as to your second paragraph- why can't you do both? Support progressive games AND criticize regressive games.
My point was just that sexism (and any other form of bigotry, really) isn't necessarily a conscious personal decision, but a systematic undercurrent of society.
Just because men succeed more than women under capitalism doesn't make it sexist, and when you start using feminism to critique our whole society instead of pieces of it, you lose me, at least. We want more games to have girls? Fine, we can work on that in a productive fashion. Wanting to tear down capitalism and/or redefine success because right now more men are doing well? That is such a big goal that you might as well push to replace cars with unicorns. Change within the system is reasonable. Change that requires discarding the system is nearly impossible (even if it were desirable) and so it isn't even practical to discuss it.
Please tell me what aspects of society are not affected by sexism.
Is it sexist to reward people who are more aggressive and assertive instead of the people who focus more on collaboration but don't put themselves front and center? The former is viewed as make behavior, but plenty of women engage in it and succeed. I would say that isn't sexist. It's just reasonable that people who act in that way find more personal success. If you want to challenge things like that, then what you are calling sexism is so incredibly broad that I cannot even agree that it is a bad thing.
No, it's not sexist to reward assertive people.
Now I have two questions for you:
1) Where did I say it was?
2) Can you please tell me what aspects of society are not affected by sexism?
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
If they do it for financial reasons, then the intent is to make money, not to keep those icky women out of games though. . .
Sexism is not necessarily a conscious intent though, but an unconscious state of being. The school of Marxist feminism would argue that capitalism is inherently sexist because it is dominated by men.
Is this really what we are talking about now? This is the kind of thing that makes people hate/not respect feminism.
Instead of hoping EA will decide to care about your social views over its own profits, why not focus on personally trying to change things by buying games that do feature women, and trying to appeal to indie developers who are looking for a niche?
Or, you know, put out a series of videos that attempts to educate gamers about the existence and harm of sexism in games.
But the entire premise of these first two videos is flawed at best. . . And even if they were perfect, the meaningful action is in supporting games that are less sexist. Like I always say In these threads, its better to support the people doing things you like than to just focus on tearing down those you don't.
I know, and you never seem to support that assertion with any sort of evidence, and you always seem to ignore that fact that the two aren't mutually exclusive.
Bioware sure seems to be embracing gay romances after all the support (and sales) the got from it.
But the point that I am (always) making here is that a single sale or foregone sale is insignificant, so the smart move (if you want to play a game) is to tell the publisher what you think, but to also buy whatever you want. But if the game sells well, then only the positive remarks are likely to be looked at, because why would the negative remarks matter if the game still sold well anyway? If it doesn't sell well, maybe your negative comment registers, but the whole studio was probably already fired anyway so it might just fall on deaf ears.
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
If they do it for financial reasons, then the intent is to make money, not to keep those icky women out of games though. . .
Sexism is not necessarily a conscious intent though, but an unconscious state of being. The school of Marxist feminism would argue that capitalism is inherently sexist because it is dominated by men.
Is this really what we are talking about now? This is the kind of thing that makes people hate/not respect feminism.
Instead of hoping EA will decide to care about your social views over its own profits, why not focus on personally trying to change things by buying games that do feature women, and trying to appeal to indie developers who are looking for a niche?
Not sure what you mean with your first two sentences (Marxism and feminism have enough in common that it makes sense that there would be study devoted to the overlap) but as to your second paragraph- why can't you do both? Support progressive games AND criticize regressive games.
My point was just that sexism (and any other form of bigotry, really) isn't necessarily a conscious personal decision, but a systematic undercurrent of society.
Just because men succeed more than women under capitalism doesn't make it sexist, and when you start using feminism to critique our whole society instead of pieces of it, you lose me, at least. We want more games to have girls? Fine, we can work on that in a productive fashion. Wanting to tear down capitalism and/or redefine success because right now more men are doing well? That is such a big goal that you might as well push to replace cars with unicorns. Change within the system is reasonable. Change that requires discarding the system is nearly impossible (even if it were desirable) and so it isn't even practical to discuss it.
Please tell me what aspects of society are not affected by sexism.
Is it sexist to reward people who are more aggressive and assertive instead of the people who focus more on collaboration but don't put themselves front and center? The former is viewed as make behavior, but plenty of women engage in it and succeed. I would say that isn't sexist. It's just reasonable that people who act in that way find more personal success. If you want to challenge things like that, then what you are calling sexism is so incredibly broad that I cannot even agree that it is a bad thing.
No, it's not sexist to reward assertive people.
Now I have two questions for you:
1) Where did I say it was?
2) Can you please tell me what aspects of society are not affected by sexism?
That was my example of an aspect of society that I don't think is affected by sexism.
If they do it for financial reasons, then the intent is to make money, not to keep those icky women out of games though. . .
Sexism is not necessarily a conscious intent though, but an unconscious state of being. The school of Marxist feminism would argue that capitalism is inherently sexist because it is dominated by men.
Is this really what we are talking about now? This is the kind of thing that makes people hate/not respect feminism.
Instead of hoping EA will decide to care about your social views over its own profits, why not focus on personally trying to change things by buying games that do feature women, and trying to appeal to indie developers who are looking for a niche?
Not sure what you mean with your first two sentences (Marxism and feminism have enough in common that it makes sense that there would be study devoted to the overlap) but as to your second paragraph- why can't you do both? Support progressive games AND criticize regressive games.
My point was just that sexism (and any other form of bigotry, really) isn't necessarily a conscious personal decision, but a systematic undercurrent of society.
Just because men succeed more than women under capitalism doesn't make it sexist, and when you start using feminism to critique our whole society instead of pieces of it, you lose me, at least. We want more games to have girls? Fine, we can work on that in a productive fashion. Wanting to tear down capitalism and/or redefine success because right now more men are doing well? That is such a big goal that you might as well push to replace cars with unicorns. Change within the system is reasonable. Change that requires discarding the system is nearly impossible (even if it were desirable) and so it isn't even practical to discuss it.
Please tell me what aspects of society are not affected by sexism.
Is it sexist to reward people who are more aggressive and assertive instead of the people who focus more on collaboration but don't put themselves front and center? The former is viewed as make behavior, but plenty of women engage in it and succeed. I would say that isn't sexist. It's just reasonable that people who act in that way find more personal success. If you want to challenge things like that, then what you are calling sexism is so incredibly broad that I cannot even agree that it is a bad thing.
No, it's not sexist to reward assertive people.
Now I have two questions for you:
1) Where did I say it was?
2) Can you please tell me what aspects of society are not affected by sexism?
That was my example of an aspect of society that I don't think is affected by sexism.
How so? The genders are not Assertive and Collaborative.
But hey let's look closer. Assertive people are rewarded. Often, rightly so. However, often, assertive men are regarded as powerful and assertive women are regarded as bitches. I would argue that that's pretty sexist.
That's just CEOs and marketing teams being extremely dumb
Right, but they're being dumb in a way that's inequally targeted and (blah blah blah, you know what I'm talking about).
Responding to a thought from earlier on, Feminism 101 stuff is rather important to keep putting out there, I'd say. I would have been one of those guys refusing to engage with the ideas presented here at all (and believing myself the wiser for it), had I not been patiently taught the error of my ways during RA training with material not dissimilar to her videos.
If cinema could do it, games can do it. When it comes down to an unconscious, ignorant motive, the conscious promise of greater wealth triumphs. It's part of the many reasons why a lot of impressive social stuff has been happening recently to little fanfare.
I have no actual complaints about the videos other than a pet peeve about lectures featuring a completely flat narrator profile looking directly at the camera. That screams "Hey Youtube" to me, and I would vastly prefer a better use of the screen real estate with more visual aids.
Paladin on
Marty: The future, it's where you're going? Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
If they do it for financial reasons, then the intent is to make money, not to keep those icky women out of games though. . .
Sexism is not necessarily a conscious intent though, but an unconscious state of being. The school of Marxist feminism would argue that capitalism is inherently sexist because it is dominated by men.
Is this really what we are talking about now? This is the kind of thing that makes people hate/not respect feminism.
Instead of hoping EA will decide to care about your social views over its own profits, why not focus on personally trying to change things by buying games that do feature women, and trying to appeal to indie developers who are looking for a niche?
Or, you know, put out a series of videos that attempts to educate gamers about the existence and harm of sexism in games.
But the entire premise of these first two videos is flawed at best. . . And even if they were perfect, the meaningful action is in supporting games that are less sexist. Like I always say In these threads, its better to support the people doing things you like than to just focus on tearing down those you don't.
I know, and you never seem to support that assertion with any sort of evidence, and you always seem to ignore that fact that the two aren't mutually exclusive.
Bioware sure seems to be embracing gay romances after all the support (and sales) the got from it.
But the point that I am (always) making here is that a single sale or foregone sale is insignificant, so the smart move (if you want to play a game) is to tell the publisher what you think, but to also buy whatever you want. But if the game sells well, then only the positive remarks are likely to be looked at, because why would the negative remarks matter if the game still sold well anyway? If it doesn't sell well, maybe your negative comment registers, but the whole studio was probably already fired anyway so it might just fall on deaf ears.
Critiques of good selling games can be a huge problem, I guess you're not keeping up with current events? See: Diablo 3, SimCity, Mass Effect 3, etc. And other people have been telling YOU that buying AND talking is of course possible, not sure how you're trying to make that part of your argument now...
Is this really what we are talking about now? This is the kind of thing that makes people hate/not respect feminism.
SKFM, your opinions regarding the righteousness of company success trumping human rights basically invalidates anything you have to say on this topic (though it is pretty hilarious that you think a company should be able to plaster topless women all over marketing material if it will make them a sale, but Google Glass technology should be restricted because oh woe indecent society!)
Posting here is a waste of your time and everyone else's.
Ok, so, work's done and I watched the videos. All I can say is... damn. Did we really have a 100 page thread about that a while back?
Because like many of you have said, there's nothing much to it. No one who agreed with her is really going to disagree with her, and there's nothing to convince anyone who didn't agree with her before. Like SKFM has articulated, a majority of her complaints are answered by simple principles of economics (which, I would argue, do not and should not follow any sort of socially progressive code. Let the consumers take care of that).
I'm intrigued to see her discussion strong female characters later on in the series. There are some really good ones, but I have a (currently unsubstantiated feeling) that it's going to be more about picking holes in them than anything else. Hopefully not.
As an addendum, that whole GTA/Hooker thing seems to be a few pages back so I'll leave it there unless someone wants me to clarify my position any.
Frankiedarling on
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FencingsaxIt is difficult to get a man to understand, when his salary depends upon his not understandingGNU Terry PratchettRegistered Userregular
Is this really what we are talking about now? This is the kind of thing that makes people hate/not respect feminism.
SKFM, your opinions regarding the righteousness of company success trumping human rights basically invalidates anything you have to say on this topic (though it is pretty hilarious that you think a company should be able to plaster topless women all over marketing material if it will make them a sale, but Google Glass technology should be restricted because oh woe indecent society!)
Posting here is a waste of your time and everyone else's.
You cut the context of the quote, which was saying that capitalism is inherently misogynistic, which is of course ridiculous. Now, the dude apparently misspoke, but the idea SKFM was reacting to was, in fact, ludicrous. And again, he isn't talking about what is morally right or wrong. He's talking about how execs actually think and react to markets, which is kinda horrifying and enraging, but the problem here is not SKFM. It's the execs who are super cautious about female protagonists because "women do not sell", while ignoring shit like Tomb Raider (ridiculous projections aside), and also ignoring that plenty of games with dudes on the cover also do not sell.
Fencingsax on
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
If they do it for financial reasons, then the intent is to make money, not to keep those icky women out of games though. . .
Sexism is not necessarily a conscious intent though, but an unconscious state of being. The school of Marxist feminism would argue that capitalism is inherently sexist because it is dominated by men.
Is this really what we are talking about now? This is the kind of thing that makes people hate/not respect feminism.
Instead of hoping EA will decide to care about your social views over its own profits, why not focus on personally trying to change things by buying games that do feature women, and trying to appeal to indie developers who are looking for a niche?
Not sure what you mean with your first two sentences (Marxism and feminism have enough in common that it makes sense that there would be study devoted to the overlap) but as to your second paragraph- why can't you do both? Support progressive games AND criticize regressive games.
My point was just that sexism (and any other form of bigotry, really) isn't necessarily a conscious personal decision, but a systematic undercurrent of society.
Just because men succeed more than women under capitalism doesn't make it sexist, and when you start using feminism to critique our whole society instead of pieces of it, you lose me, at least. We want more games to have girls? Fine, we can work on that in a productive fashion. Wanting to tear down capitalism and/or redefine success because right now more men are doing well? That is such a big goal that you might as well push to replace cars with unicorns. Change within the system is reasonable. Change that requires discarding the system is nearly impossible (even if it were desirable) and so it isn't even practical to discuss it.
Please tell me what aspects of society are not affected by sexism.
Is it sexist to reward people who are more aggressive and assertive instead of the people who focus more on collaboration but don't put themselves front and center? The former is viewed as make behavior, but plenty of women engage in it and succeed. I would say that isn't sexist. It's just reasonable that people who act in that way find more personal success. If you want to challenge things like that, then what you are calling sexism is so incredibly broad that I cannot even agree that it is a bad thing.
No, it's not sexist to reward assertive people.
Now I have two questions for you:
1) Where did I say it was?
2) Can you please tell me what aspects of society are not affected by sexism?
That was my example of an aspect of society that I don't think is affected by sexism.
How so? The genders are not Assertive and Collaborative.
But hey let's look closer. Assertive people are rewarded. Often, rightly so. However, often, assertive men are regarded as powerful and assertive women are regarded as bitches. I would argue that that's pretty sexist.
Stop moving the goalposts. You are admitting that rewarding assertiveness is a part of society that isn't sexist. That was all you asked for.
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
Is this really what we are talking about now? This is the kind of thing that makes people hate/not respect feminism.
SKFM, your opinions regarding the righteousness of company success trumping human rights basically invalidates anything you have to say on this topic (though it is pretty hilarious that you think a company should be able to plaster topless women all over marketing material if it will make them a sale, but Google Glass technology should be restricted because oh woe indecent society!)
Posting here is a waste of your time and everyone else's.
Come on. You've discussed this with me before, so you know I support government regulation. Do you really think sexism in games is susceptible to a regulatory solution like glass is?
Posts
Honestly I feel Jimquisition covers these issues better than Anita on a "how does the industry fix the problems" level
I found this one pretty damned insightful assuming all his sources are correct, about why there aren't female protagonists
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/jimquisition/7044-The-Creepy-Cull-of-Female-Protagonists
This one is about the "BUT MEN ARE OBJECTIFIED TOO" internet wharblgarbl
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/jimquisition/7290-Objectification-And-Men
And this is a good one about, not sexism in games in particular, but why games so frequently have the same fucking target demo
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/jimquisition/7161-Perfect-Pasta-Sauce
Even the point in the OP ('it would be good if she addressed counterexamples') isn't much to go on, since as @Blackjack pointed out, those are coming in the next video.
I guess we could go over the stuff that makes her points anodyne, the stuff that she regrettably fails to even mention let alone attempt to cite in any organized manner, but then this would just be a feminism 101 thread, yes? I'm glad the videos exist insofar as they are great awareness raisers, and Sarkeesian's noble endurance of hundreds (thousands?) of death threats, rape threats, and so on is (weirdly and sadly) one of the most interesting things to come from the whole process, but... there's just not a lot to talk about in the videos themselves.
But hey, we could always use more agitators. Things are already getting better- the indie game scene and the Twine scene in particular are constantly putting out progressively-minded games dealing with a variety of social issues, and those games which are actually good are starting to get mainsteam video game press attention as well.
Did you read the post you are responding to? I am saying that the whole premise of her argument is wrong, because she is ignoring the fact that developers are starting from a position of straight male protagonists for financial reasons. That is why the trope of rescuing women is so common, IMO. That isn't sexist.
Are you saying that financially-motivated decisions can't be sexist?
so if a sexist attitude will get them more money that's what they're going to do
I don't agree with that assessment, Tomb Raider did pretty good for example (despite their hilarious sales predictions), and games like Medal of Honor do poorly - targeting the dudebro demographic only yields so much.
I also disagree it's necessary to be either lazy or sexist. The argument can be made that a game from a developer under EA has to have a male lead walking towards the camera with an orange glow because the publisher wants them to. There is no realistic justification for why Zelda and Mario have to keep using women as a thing to be rescued beyond "they've always done it that way". They won't lose sales if they go in a difff.f.. oh right Wind Waker
Nevermind, consumers suck
If they do it for financial reasons, then the intent is to make money, not to keep those icky women out of games though. . .
Why should Mario or Zelda change? They have winning formulas that people love. Metroid already has a female protagonist.
Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
Sexism is not necessarily a conscious intent though, but an unconscious state of being. The school of Marxist feminism would argue that capitalism is inherently sexist because it is dominated by men.
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
currently, not inherently. And it's called Marxist because the solution is also a redistribution of wealth.
Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
It can still be de facto sexist. Basically maybe we can argue for sexism like you can for negligent homicide. The intent to kill is not there, but the person takes actions that end up causing a wrongful death due to a failure to cover the forseeable results of their actions the way a reasonable person would.
So the intent to be sexist is not there, but the company in the search for profits creates a product which any reasonable person would take a look at and say "Hey we can't ship this, its a sexist piece of crap"
Is this really what we are talking about now? This is the kind of thing that makes people hate/not respect feminism.
Instead of hoping EA will decide to care about your social views over its own profits, why not focus on personally trying to change things by buying games that do feature women, and trying to appeal to indie developers who are looking for a niche?
But it's a different problem than claiming women are made weak macguffins in games because sexism. If she wants to say women are rarely protagonists, you'll get no argument from me.
Or, you know, put out a series of videos that attempts to educate gamers about the existence and harm of sexism in games.
Does anybody remember wanting to purchase Galactic Civilizations II?
Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
That doesn't help! Because something something capitalism!
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
Your premise is "they are trying to make the most money" but the answer is "they are not even doing a very good job of that." Medal of Honor Warfighter was a huge fail that crushed the studio. Tomb Raider (probably the most progressive game in the series for the most part) was easily the best selling in the series. Mirror's Edge didn't sell the best, but... compared to what? Call of Duty? Why would you compare every segment of the market to the most successful one? This is the sort of thinking that led to the crash of the American car industry...
Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
Not sure what you mean with your first two sentences (Marxism and feminism have enough in common that it makes sense that there would be study devoted to the overlap) but as to your second paragraph- why can't you do both? Support progressive games AND criticize regressive games.
My point was just that sexism (and any other form of bigotry, really) isn't necessarily a conscious personal decision, but a systematic undercurrent of society.
But the entire premise of these first two videos is flawed at best. . . And even if they were perfect, the meaningful action is in supporting games that are less sexist. Like I always say In these threads, its better to support the people doing things you like than to just focus on tearing down those you don't.
Right, but they're being dumb in a way that's inequally targeted and (blah blah blah, you know what I'm talking about).
Responding to a thought from earlier on, Feminism 101 stuff is rather important to keep putting out there, I'd say. I would have been one of those guys refusing to engage with the ideas presented here at all (and believing myself the wiser for it), had I not been patiently taught the error of my ways during RA training with material not dissimilar to her videos.
I know, and you never seem to support that assertion with any sort of evidence, and you always seem to ignore that fact that the two aren't mutually exclusive.
Just because men succeed more than women under capitalism doesn't make it sexist, and when you start using feminism to critique our whole society instead of pieces of it, you lose me, at least. We want more games to have girls? Fine, we can work on that in a productive fashion. Wanting to tear down capitalism and/or redefine success because right now more men are doing well? That is such a big goal that you might as well push to replace cars with unicorns. Change within the system is reasonable. Change that requires discarding the system is nearly impossible (even if it were desirable) and so it isn't even practical to discuss it.
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
Because I cant buy an anti-game. This was the point I was trying to make with the Bitch magazine's gaming tag list. If in 3 years you mention one game in a I played this game heres a review sense and the rest of your coverage is the standard litany of feminist media criticism 101, how is that going to influence a market towards serving you. Were there no gender neutral games in the last 3 years?
Is it sexist to reward people who are more aggressive and assertive instead of the people who focus more on collaboration but don't put themselves front and center? The former is viewed as make behavior, but plenty of women engage in it and succeed. I would say that isn't sexist. It's just reasonable that people who act in that way find more personal success. If you want to challenge things like that, then what you are calling sexism is so incredibly broad that I cannot even agree that it is a bad thing.
Jim Sterling had a really good video about how complaining about problems in gaming has had a MUCH more powerful effect than any sort of "boycott" or "economic protest." And there's a lot of reasons for that. For one thing, a favorite argument of any defender of any material thing is "how do you know it's bad, you haven't even tried it!" And then people who buy it chime it that "no, it really was bad actually" and then the goalposts are quickly moved to "well, they got your money anyway, chump, they don't care what you think."
Second point along this line, buying something ISN'T showing any kind of opinion. I could be buying it because I'm bored or because it was cheap or because my friends pressured me into it or I just like shooters or whatever. How do the creators know that the social justice part is the part I liked? Well, I guess I could engage in critical analysis and TALK about it, but there you go again trying to say that buying is super superior to talking about it.
Another thing in the whole "buy it or don't", what if I buy it and I'm disappointed in the content? Like it made a bad argument or whatever and now I start spreading bad word of mouth? In your model, I'm really a supporter, because I bought it.
Next up, what if NO games are sufficiently positive? The only way you'd get there is through criticism like this. I can't support something that doesn't exist, but I CAN strongly state my preference for thing X.
To be clear, I'm not saying economic support is useless or that idle chatter is the most powerful force in the universe, just that this "buy it or don't" argument is INCREDIBLY lame.
No, it's not sexist to reward assertive people.
Now I have two questions for you:
1) Where did I say it was?
2) Can you please tell me what aspects of society are not affected by sexism?
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
Bioware sure seems to be embracing gay romances after all the support (and sales) the got from it.
But the point that I am (always) making here is that a single sale or foregone sale is insignificant, so the smart move (if you want to play a game) is to tell the publisher what you think, but to also buy whatever you want. But if the game sells well, then only the positive remarks are likely to be looked at, because why would the negative remarks matter if the game still sold well anyway? If it doesn't sell well, maybe your negative comment registers, but the whole studio was probably already fired anyway so it might just fall on deaf ears.
That was my example of an aspect of society that I don't think is affected by sexism.
But hey let's look closer. Assertive people are rewarded. Often, rightly so. However, often, assertive men are regarded as powerful and assertive women are regarded as bitches. I would argue that that's pretty sexist.
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
If cinema could do it, games can do it. When it comes down to an unconscious, ignorant motive, the conscious promise of greater wealth triumphs. It's part of the many reasons why a lot of impressive social stuff has been happening recently to little fanfare.
I have no actual complaints about the videos other than a pet peeve about lectures featuring a completely flat narrator profile looking directly at the camera. That screams "Hey Youtube" to me, and I would vastly prefer a better use of the screen real estate with more visual aids.
Doc: That's right, twenty five years into the future. I've always dreamed on seeing the future, looking beyond my years, seeing the progress of mankind. I'll also be able to see who wins the next twenty-five world series.
Critiques of good selling games can be a huge problem, I guess you're not keeping up with current events? See: Diablo 3, SimCity, Mass Effect 3, etc. And other people have been telling YOU that buying AND talking is of course possible, not sure how you're trying to make that part of your argument now...
SKFM, your opinions regarding the righteousness of company success trumping human rights basically invalidates anything you have to say on this topic (though it is pretty hilarious that you think a company should be able to plaster topless women all over marketing material if it will make them a sale, but Google Glass technology should be restricted because oh woe indecent society!)
Posting here is a waste of your time and everyone else's.
Because like many of you have said, there's nothing much to it. No one who agreed with her is really going to disagree with her, and there's nothing to convince anyone who didn't agree with her before. Like SKFM has articulated, a majority of her complaints are answered by simple principles of economics (which, I would argue, do not and should not follow any sort of socially progressive code. Let the consumers take care of that).
I'm intrigued to see her discussion strong female characters later on in the series. There are some really good ones, but I have a (currently unsubstantiated feeling) that it's going to be more about picking holes in them than anything else. Hopefully not.
As an addendum, that whole GTA/Hooker thing seems to be a few pages back so I'll leave it there unless someone wants me to clarify my position any.
You cut the context of the quote, which was saying that capitalism is inherently misogynistic, which is of course ridiculous. Now, the dude apparently misspoke, but the idea SKFM was reacting to was, in fact, ludicrous. And again, he isn't talking about what is morally right or wrong. He's talking about how execs actually think and react to markets, which is kinda horrifying and enraging, but the problem here is not SKFM. It's the execs who are super cautious about female protagonists because "women do not sell", while ignoring shit like Tomb Raider (ridiculous projections aside), and also ignoring that plenty of games with dudes on the cover also do not sell.
Stop moving the goalposts. You are admitting that rewarding assertiveness is a part of society that isn't sexist. That was all you asked for.
Come on. You've discussed this with me before, so you know I support government regulation. Do you really think sexism in games is susceptible to a regulatory solution like glass is?