Anger works great on some people, though others see those posts and just skip them. Though as long as there's both kinds of people it's all good, and we have it here.
Anyway I saw a mention of Monaco and the sexy character a page back, and I wanted to add the creator's response to criticism about it. I have not had the chance to play the game so I will withhold any comment on it. Of course I can't find the video anymore (I think it was Devlog #4). Instead here's an article where there's a little bit of talk between the creator and a blogger: link
To conclude, my point is: If equality in games continues to be framed as a "battle" instead of a negotiation or a dialog, it will continue to meet resistance. You cannot force people to accept you and consider your point of view, you must be calm, patient, and understanding to generate empathy despite the indignations you have suffered or perceive.
When I participate in discussions like these, I try to be calm, patient, and understanding. It's easy for me to do this because I have not suffered any indignations thanks to all the privilege I enjoy. Guess what kind of response I often get for my calm, patient, and understanding approach.
Face it, anger and forcefulness demand attention. Insisting that people "play nice" only makes it easier to ignore them.
Speaking softly and gently while stroking the opposition's head has been tried. It. doesn't. work.
If that doesn't work then why would insulting them be more effective? If someone is being stubborn and close-minded then I doubt any approach will work. The only benefit that being hostile and condescending has over being patient in this situation is that you get to vent your outrage.
To conclude, my point is: If equality in games continues to be framed as a "battle" instead of a negotiation or a dialog, it will continue to meet resistance. You cannot force people to accept you and consider your point of view, you must be calm, patient, and understanding to generate empathy despite the indignations you have suffered or perceive.
When I participate in discussions like these, I try to be calm, patient, and understanding. It's easy for me to do this because I have not suffered any indignations thanks to all the privilege I enjoy. Guess what kind of response I often get for my calm, patient, and understanding approach.
Face it, anger and forcefulness demand attention. Insisting that people "play nice" only makes it easier to ignore them.
Not all types of attention are good. Trolls are an example.
Speaking softly and gently while stroking the opposition's head has been tried. It. doesn't. work.
If that doesn't work then why would insulting them be more effective? If someone is being stubborn and close-minded then I doubt any approach will work. The only benefit that being hostile and condescending has over being patient in this situation is that you get to vent your outrage.
interestingly enough....while you may not convince the person you're arguing with, the sheer volume of your discussion may draw plenty of bystanders* who, seeing the debate, become convinced that you are right :P
still, i'm as much a fan of civil discourse as anyone, but a heated argument isn't always a bad thing.
*yes lurkers, i'm talking to you :P
Registered just for the Mass Effect threads | Steam: click ^^^ | Origin: curlyhairedboy
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CambiataCommander ShepardThe likes of which even GAWD has never seenRegistered Userregular
Speaking softly and gently while stroking the opposition's head has been tried. It. doesn't. work.
If that doesn't work then why would insulting them be more effective? If someone is being stubborn and close-minded then I doubt any approach will work. The only benefit that being hostile and condescending has over being patient in this situation is that you get to vent your outrage.
Well I hope we aren't going to get sidetracked on worthless discussions of tone, but keep in mind what the people who disagree with the concept that sexism is a problem in gaming consider "insulting."
Logan Ran considers the very fact that I think I have knowledge that some other people might not have as putting myself in a superior position. This is something he says to me immediately after he says this about himself:
These are the questions and answers I've analyzed and come to in my years of following this social phenomenon.
The things we are saying in this thread will always be an insult to someone who comes to this thread eager to battle the straw feminists that they are so certain reside here.
Cambiata on
"If you divide the whole world into just enemies and friends, you'll end up destroying everything" --Nausicaa of the Valley of Wind
Another reason many gamers feel offended by the movement is the self-righteous atmosphere and sentiment of many people who fight for equality in games.
You could apply this to any activist cause, even the ones that really are in the right. I'm sure there are plenty of perfectly reasonable feminists, just like there are perfectly reasonable environmentalists and animal rights activists and even Christians.
However, I assume that the more devoted you are to a cause that actively opposes a facet of society the more violently you react to others that don't share your point of view, which doesn't do any favors for your cause. Even patient activists eventually get worn down and bitter if they don't see any evidence that their cause is being progressed.
I've seen pieces on sites such as Jezebel that acted as if using the word "lady" in any context was a horrific slur, I've heard personal anecdotes from men who were publicly yelled at for holding a door open for a woman, and I've seen feminist analyses of television shows that seemed to go out of their way to try and characterize everything that happens in regards to female characters as misogyny (A male does something for a female? The man clearly thinks the woman can't fend for herself. The same woman does something for the same man? The woman clearly exists only to serve the needs of the man.). Those are rare, extreme examples, but they are often the ones that many people are most aware of and the reason that in the minds of the general public feminists (and environmentalists and animal rights activists and etc) are a bunch of crazy people who are constantly blowing up mole hills into entire mountain ranges of hysteria.
And what of your camp's loudmouthed misogynists?
No progressive movement is ever really monolithic.
That's true.
I'd also like to think that I'm not really part of that camp and agree with you guys more than I probably gave the impression I do. The only poster I can think of off hand that I don't agree with in "your camp" is Death of Rats and his "objectification is always wrong" view, although I'm going to try and understand all of his/her/I dunno which's points.
To conclude, my point is: If equality in games continues to be framed as a "battle" instead of a negotiation or a dialog, it will continue to meet resistance. You cannot force people to accept you and consider your point of view, you must be calm, patient, and understanding to generate empathy despite the indignations you have suffered or perceive.
When I participate in discussions like these, I try to be calm, patient, and understanding. It's easy for me to do this because I have not suffered any indignations thanks to all the privilege I enjoy. Guess what kind of response I often get for my calm, patient, and understanding approach.
Face it, anger and forcefulness demand attention. Insisting that people "play nice" only makes it easier to ignore them.
Not all types of attention are good. Trolls are an example.
Are you suggesting that trolls don't want the attention that they receive?
To conclude, my point is: If equality in games continues to be framed as a "battle" instead of a negotiation or a dialog, it will continue to meet resistance. You cannot force people to accept you and consider your point of view, you must be calm, patient, and understanding to generate empathy despite the indignations you have suffered or perceive.
When I participate in discussions like these, I try to be calm, patient, and understanding. It's easy for me to do this because I have not suffered any indignations thanks to all the privilege I enjoy. Guess what kind of response I often get for my calm, patient, and understanding approach.
Face it, anger and forcefulness demand attention. Insisting that people "play nice" only makes it easier to ignore them.
Not all types of attention are good. Trolls are an example.
This is an odd, small response given what people have said to you so far, and it's oddly pedantic too, given the scope of your initial post.
Are you really interested in continuing the discussion?
Maybe the mods could rule that someone trying to drag this particular topic off-topic to anything else is infraction-worthy- in addition to whatever the troll is trying to do in the thread- and use the oversized hammer when delivering those particular points? This is a good thread, and I love the discussion, but more often than not we seem to end up talking over stupid shit like how people are making their arguments instead of the actual argument. I'm tired of finding ten new posts where it's just some damned troll making waves and waving his tiny e-peen with one finger and nine people replying to them. Someone eating five or six points for one post might get through thier heads and give us a chance for some better discussion...
JaysonFour on
I can has cheezburger, yes?
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CambiataCommander ShepardThe likes of which even GAWD has never seenRegistered Userregular
I guess I just see "male power fantasy" and "female sexual fantasy" as very often being the same thing.
A guy might be the quarterback of the football team and the perfect man, and all the other guys in the school might envy him and want to be him, and all the girls might want to get with him and fuck him, but it's the same guy in both scenarios. The guys want to be him and the girls want to fuck him.
But vsove and A duck! have a very good point: When a character in a game is molded specifically towards female desire in a video game, cis male gamers often complain longly and loud about how lame and terrible and "gay" that character is.
People are still on about how terrible Carth Onassi is, who I was absolutely in love with as a teenager playing the game.
Women seem to be mainly societal encouraged to like the sort of men who are "acceptably masculine." As if a man's opinion is the final word on what we can allow females to see. From what I've read, deliberately appealing to the "female gaze" is something that even the porn industry apparently avoids.
Sorry to bring this up from forever ago (in thread-time), but I was following on my phone today and wanted to comment. This little bit of conversation, specifically the parts about Carth Onassi, totally blew my mind. For some unexcusable reason, I had never played Knights of the Old Republic until a few years ago, but even before I touched it I knew that this Carth guy was annoying, because I had always heard as much from the internet. (read: video game playing dudes) And yet my girlfriend, and also one of her female friends, were always talking about how great he was. To hear it from them, this Carth guy was a reason that the game was great. To hear it from the internet (read: video game playing dudes) he was a target of ridicule and derision and I should ignore him as much as possible and certainly never use him in my party.
So when I finally played the game, I was surprised that my reactions to him were so tame, in both directions. Why did the internet hate this guy so much? I liked him, but why did I not find him as amazing as I was told I would? I didn't find him annoying at all, but I didn't love him either. I guess didn't hate him because I'm not an asshole, I think that explanation was always obvious. But why didn't I love him? At the time I didn't think much of it, but thinking about it now I guess its probably because he's not for me. And that's not only okay, its fucking awesome. I'm a young white male, fucking everything is for me already! KOTOR is I think the only reason that my girlfriend ever entered the world of gaming, and I bet Carth Onassi is a big part of it. More of that please.
I'm concerned this post might have gotten lost since the bullshit tone argument came immediately after it, so I just want to say: this is great and thank you for posting it!
"If you divide the whole world into just enemies and friends, you'll end up destroying everything" --Nausicaa of the Valley of Wind
What else can we talk about? Well, we know that despite their half-apology, Deep Silver is still shipping and selling the Dead Island Riptide Poor Taste Torso Edition. It's not great that publishers have this idea that they can do (or plan to do) something in poor taste, apologize, and then do the thing they apologized for anyway. But how can we stop them? If we already decided that we weren't going to buy the thing, what other pressure can we exert? Who can we exert it on? I don't live in the UK, which obviously makes things even more complicated.
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CambiataCommander ShepardThe likes of which even GAWD has never seenRegistered Userregular
I don't think anyone has mentioned this yet: The video of the #1reasontobe panel from GDC is up on their website: http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1018080/
"If you divide the whole world into just enemies and friends, you'll end up destroying everything" --Nausicaa of the Valley of Wind
I wouldn't be upset if we did that, though I will say I would find it odd that discussing how to best spread awareness of the problem and convince people there is a problem in the first place is out of bounds on this thread.
What else can we talk about? Well, we know that despite their half-apology, Deep Silver is still shipping and selling the Dead Island Riptide Poor Taste Torso Edition. It's not great that publishers have this idea that they can do (or plan to do) something in poor taste, apologize, and then do the thing they apologized for anyway. But how can we stop them? If we already decided that we weren't going to buy the thing, what other pressure can we exert? Who can we exert it on? I don't live in the UK, which obviously makes things even more complicated.
At that point, it's really about continuing the discourse and using their actions as a bad example whenever someone asks for a representation of what not to do. Again, shame isn't really the best learning tool but as was pointed out earlier if they're going to just be completely pants-on-head about it all you can really hope to do is point out how pants-on-head it is so that other people reading/listening in learn something from it.
Exactly. Just point out how in-bad-taste that statue is, and hope that it gets through the head of other developers so something like that doesn't happen again. I mean, the thing that gets me about it is they knew it was in really poor taste, but they did it anyways. That's not really a company I would want to give money to anymore.
What else can we talk about? Well, we know that despite their half-apology, Deep Silver is still shipping and selling the Dead Island Riptide Poor Taste Torso Edition. It's not great that publishers have this idea that they can do (or plan to do) something in poor taste, apologize, and then do the thing they apologized for anyway. But how can we stop them? If we already decided that we weren't going to buy the thing, what other pressure can we exert? Who can we exert it on? I don't live in the UK, which obviously makes things even more complicated.
At that point, it's really about continuing the discourse and using their actions as a bad example whenever someone asks for a representation of what not to do. Again, shame isn't really the best learning tool but as was pointed out earlier if they're going to just be completely pants-on-head about it all you can really hope to do is point out how pants-on-head it is so that other people reading/listening in learn something from it.
I don't like your tone, sir!
Play along with me here. Your position is reasonable, I can't think of any other way to keep the conversation going.
If you want to see a great example of how effective the "Get people very outraged over everything and shame non-believers until they listen to reason" strategy is, look to Fox News. They're pretty much the master class in using that strategy (though their cause is different.)
So has Fox News been a good thing for the conservative movement? Whatever your answer to that is, you can probably expect sites like Jezebel to push towards a similar outcome for the feminist movement.
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CambiataCommander ShepardThe likes of which even GAWD has never seenRegistered Userregular
I wouldn't be upset if we did that, though I will say I would find it odd that discussing how to best spread awareness of the problem and change people's minds is apparently of bounds in this thread.
Anyone who is a novice in discussing this issue will have trouble understanding why something like this will seem objectionable. To someone not used to having these discussions across the web, things like "you should talk more nicely" perhaps seem like good advice.
When you spend a lot of time discussion this issue, you tend to see the "you need to be nicer" angle most often by people who aren't actually in any way interested in furthering the goals of feminism, yet they act like a patient mentor explaining how others can be better feminists. To anyone who's spent a lot of time reading these discussions, these derails appear frequently, and are always presented by the person bringing them up as some kind of new and never before discovered line of reasoning, which adds to the irritation.
Frequent derails used in feminist discussions:
- You should be nicer
- You say all this about women, but what about men's issues
- You shouldn't complain about this, people in [wherever] have it much worse
- [Whoever] gets angry about objectification, but then I see she wears makeup and dresses attractively, what a hypocrite
- Why are you all so upset, it's only a [video game/tv show/movie/comic book/etc.]
"If you divide the whole world into just enemies and friends, you'll end up destroying everything" --Nausicaa of the Valley of Wind
If you want to see a great example of how effective the "Get people very outraged over everything and shame non-believers until they listen to reason" strategy is, look to Fox News. They're pretty much the master class in using that strategy (though their cause is different.)
So has Fox News been a good thing for the conservative movement? Whatever your answer to that is, you can probably expect sites like Jezebel to push towards a similar outcome for the feminist movement.
No. I cannot in good faith agree with this course of action. Not only does it create the worst kind of toxic vitriol whenever any form of reasonable debate is wont to take place it speaks to the worst kind of mentality in relation to how the public at large reacts to anything new in a discussion or how opinions based on facts are interpreted. The divisive nature of our current political process here in the U.S. stems from this and is one of the major reasons why I ended up not voting for anyone in the previous election.
Another reason many gamers feel offended by the movement is the self-righteous atmosphere and sentiment of many people who fight for equality in games.
You could apply this to any activist cause, even the ones that really are in the right. I'm sure there are plenty of perfectly reasonable feminists, just like there are perfectly reasonable environmentalists and animal rights activists and even Christians.
However, I assume that the more devoted you are to a cause that actively opposes a facet of society the more violently you react to others that don't share your point of view, which doesn't do any favors for your cause. Even patient activists eventually get worn down and bitter if they don't see any evidence that their cause is being progressed.
I've seen pieces on sites such as Jezebel that acted as if using the word "lady" in any context was a horrific slur, I've heard personal anecdotes from men who were publicly yelled at for holding a door open for a woman, and I've seen feminist analyses of television shows that seemed to go out of their way to try and characterize everything that happens in regards to female characters as misogyny (A male does something for a female? The man clearly thinks the woman can't fend for herself. The same woman does something for the same man? The woman clearly exists only to serve the needs of the man.). Those are rare, extreme examples, but they are often the ones that many people are most aware of and the reason that in the minds of the general public feminists (and environmentalists and animal rights activists and etc) are a bunch of crazy people who are constantly blowing up mole hills into entire mountain ranges of hysteria.
And what of your camp's loudmouthed misogynists?
No progressive movement is ever really monolithic.
That's true.
I'd also like to think that I'm not really part of that camp and agree with you guys more than I probably gave the impression I do. The only poster I can think of off hand that I don't agree with in "your camp" is Death of Rats and his "objectification is always wrong" view, although I'm going to try and understand all of his/her/I dunno which's points.
Your wording seemed to imply that you weren't a feminist yourself.
You can't remain neutral. Remaining neutral puts you with the status quo, which is against us.
I'd like to think that gender equality isn't a "for us or against us" type of thing, but it very much is. You don't have to be vocal about it, but without considering gender equality in every social interaction you're perpetuating gender stereotypes (ie misogyny). This puts someone in the other camp.
Now there may be some of us that occasionally lack tact, but we've just grown bitter from the demeaning norm. The only ones who I think are truly problematic are those who seek to exclude heterosexual white males, and those who dismiss other causes and convergent perspectives. As I said before: no progressive movement is really monolithic. A small number of misguided proponents doesn't invalidate our argument. Especially when you put their everyday interactions with a hurtful status quo in perspective.
I'm not sure if objectification is wrong in every context myself. It could be, or it may have some use as a form of artistic expression or parody far removed from the norm. I really don't know.
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reVerseAttack and Dethrone GodRegistered Userregular
Troll PMs? What kind of amateur wastes their time trolling just one person?
Logan, apparently. He sent me and Cambiata and who knows how many others hate mail on an alt account. Duck got to swing the banhammer twice, so I think they got a kick out of it, too.
But to be on topic, I agree that it has to be everybody sitting down and working out a solution together. Fighting against each other just leads to more Dragon's Crowns and more fighting.
If you want to see a great example of how effective the "Get people very outraged over everything and shame non-believers until they listen to reason" strategy is, look to Fox News. They're pretty much the master class in using that strategy (though their cause is different.)
So has Fox News been a good thing for the conservative movement? Whatever your answer to that is, you can probably expect sites like Jezebel to push towards a similar outcome for the feminist movement.
No. I cannot in good faith agree with this course of action. Not only does it create the worst kind of toxic vitriol whenever any form of reasonable debate is wont to take place it speaks to the worst kind of mentality in relation to how the public at large reacts to anything new in a discussion or how opinions based on facts are interpreted. The divisive nature of our current political process here in the U.S. stems from this and is one of the major reasons why I ended up not voting for anyone in the previous election.
Fuck that noise.
I don't know. A Fox-like approach that uses and foments populist outrage might not be so bad if it stood on a foundation of rigorous and uncompromising commitment to the truth. Or, at the very least, the absolute best information out there.
I agree that an action game will not sell as well if it has a gal on the boxart instead of the usual guy.
This may be getting ahead of the immediate goals of this thread, but to what extent should we account for plain old consumer apathy when we talk about games with good representation?
If the ideal in this case is that the player realizes what a great contribution to the game Elizabeth makes, then I don't buy Bosman's logic about the cover, because not everyone will be receiving "the same message." Not everyone will play the game with an open mind, or to completion, or even with their full attention, and not everyone will appreciate what Elizabeth brings to the table. So why bother trying to appeal to someone who's making those kind of snap judgments habitually if they don't get what you're advocating?
Don't the benefits outweigh the risks to put Elizabeth out there for other receptive individuals who 1.) Don't have a strong established position on gender issues and 2.) See games as fun, but aren't used to having games affect them in meaningful ways?
I feel that many of my friends fall into this group. They enjoy games, but don't necessarily play them to completion, and in most cases would rather play multiplayer games because of the social aspect of them. For the most part, character art or motivation are going to be incidental to the immediate fun they have playing them. But I doubt that a cover more like this (original link) would turn them away from it, and might help sell them on it.
I realize this may be a nonissue if we assume those people aren't going to be interested in the game anyway, but I'm curious to get others' opinions.
I don't think anyone has mentioned this yet: The video of the #1reasontobe panel from GDC is up on their website: http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1018080/
Ok I only just finished watching this, and I hope everyone in this thread gives this a view. Some of the speakers are clearly not used to public speaking so there are a lot of "ums", but it's really worth watching, especially for Brenda Romero's part at the end.
"If you divide the whole world into just enemies and friends, you'll end up destroying everything" --Nausicaa of the Valley of Wind
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Dhalphirdon't you open that trapdooryou're a fool if you dareRegistered Userregular
Lizards don't have breasts! Lizards come from eggs!
Argonians could be monotremes?
They still wouldn't have breasts.
The Argonians are not an evolved species as you would think of the others. They are created by the Hist (specifically, the sap) and this sap gives them humanoid features. The extent to which they are imbued by the sap and the Hist magic varies, and thus so does the extent of their transformation into a humanoid.
Arguing whether or not they should have breasts misses the point entirely.
how convenient for the developers that the backstory they designed allows them to put breasts on the character they designed.
Dhalphir on
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Dhalphirdon't you open that trapdooryou're a fool if you dareRegistered Userregular
Lizards don't have breasts! Lizards come from eggs!
Argonians could be monotremes?
They still wouldn't have breasts.
The Argonians are not an evolved species as you would think of the others. They are created by the Hist (specifically, the sap) and this sap gives them humanoid features. The extent to which they are imbued by the sap and the Hist magic varies, and thus so does the extent of their transformation into a humanoid.
Arguing whether or not they should have breasts misses the point entirely.
how convenient for the developers that the backstory they designed allows them to put breasts on the character they designed.
It more serves to satisfy the curiosity of why Argonians look different every game. PS, the Elder Scrolls series goes back much further than even the ability to make characters look sexy, so I would hold up a bit on the conspiracy theories regarding the lore.
It's a bit of a tinfoil hat position. I mean, if you want to see how far the rabbit hole goes, be my guest- http://www.reddit.com/r/teslore/
I love the Elder Scrolls series and I can't make heads nor tails of most of that board's discussions.
Steam and CFN: Enexemander
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Dhalphirdon't you open that trapdooryou're a fool if you dareRegistered Userregular
edited April 2013
I'm just pointing out that justification within narrative is not a defense for sexist character design, never has been and never will be.
the Elder Scrolls games are actually some of the best for staying away from unnecessarily sexy character design, apart from some boob-plate issues.
I'm just pointing out that justification within narrative is not a defense for sexist character design, never has been and never will be.
I'm sorry. Are you saying that the argonian design is sexist? Really?
It contains the same underlying tones that every sexist character design does. Why do lizard people need boobs? I don't care about whatever in-universe justification they have - they wrote that shit themselves.
The same thing goes for the Khajit. Why do the Khajit females need two humanoid breasts? Cats don't have that!
Posts
Anyway I saw a mention of Monaco and the sexy character a page back, and I wanted to add the creator's response to criticism about it. I have not had the chance to play the game so I will withhold any comment on it. Of course I can't find the video anymore (I think it was Devlog #4). Instead here's an article where there's a little bit of talk between the creator and a blogger: link
Twitter
When I participate in discussions like these, I try to be calm, patient, and understanding. It's easy for me to do this because I have not suffered any indignations thanks to all the privilege I enjoy. Guess what kind of response I often get for my calm, patient, and understanding approach.
Face it, anger and forcefulness demand attention. Insisting that people "play nice" only makes it easier to ignore them.
If that doesn't work then why would insulting them be more effective? If someone is being stubborn and close-minded then I doubt any approach will work. The only benefit that being hostile and condescending has over being patient in this situation is that you get to vent your outrage.
Not all types of attention are good. Trolls are an example.
still, i'm as much a fan of civil discourse as anyone, but a heated argument isn't always a bad thing.
*yes lurkers, i'm talking to you :P
Registered just for the Mass Effect threads | Steam: click ^^^ | Origin: curlyhairedboy
Well I hope we aren't going to get sidetracked on worthless discussions of tone, but keep in mind what the people who disagree with the concept that sexism is a problem in gaming consider "insulting."
Logan Ran considers the very fact that I think I have knowledge that some other people might not have as putting myself in a superior position. This is something he says to me immediately after he says this about himself:
The things we are saying in this thread will always be an insult to someone who comes to this thread eager to battle the straw feminists that they are so certain reside here.
That's true.
I'd also like to think that I'm not really part of that camp and agree with you guys more than I probably gave the impression I do. The only poster I can think of off hand that I don't agree with in "your camp" is Death of Rats and his "objectification is always wrong" view, although I'm going to try and understand all of his/her/I dunno which's points.
Are you suggesting that trolls don't want the attention that they receive?
This is an odd, small response given what people have said to you so far, and it's oddly pedantic too, given the scope of your initial post.
Are you really interested in continuing the discussion?
I can has cheezburger, yes?
I'm concerned this post might have gotten lost since the bullshit tone argument came immediately after it, so I just want to say: this is great and thank you for posting it!
At that point, it's really about continuing the discourse and using their actions as a bad example whenever someone asks for a representation of what not to do. Again, shame isn't really the best learning tool but as was pointed out earlier if they're going to just be completely pants-on-head about it all you can really hope to do is point out how pants-on-head it is so that other people reading/listening in learn something from it.
FFXIV - Milliardo Beoulve/Sargatanas
I can has cheezburger, yes?
I don't like your tone, sir!
So has Fox News been a good thing for the conservative movement? Whatever your answer to that is, you can probably expect sites like Jezebel to push towards a similar outcome for the feminist movement.
Anyone who is a novice in discussing this issue will have trouble understanding why something like this will seem objectionable. To someone not used to having these discussions across the web, things like "you should talk more nicely" perhaps seem like good advice.
When you spend a lot of time discussion this issue, you tend to see the "you need to be nicer" angle most often by people who aren't actually in any way interested in furthering the goals of feminism, yet they act like a patient mentor explaining how others can be better feminists. To anyone who's spent a lot of time reading these discussions, these derails appear frequently, and are always presented by the person bringing them up as some kind of new and never before discovered line of reasoning, which adds to the irritation.
Frequent derails used in feminist discussions:
- You should be nicer
- You say all this about women, but what about men's issues
- You shouldn't complain about this, people in [wherever] have it much worse
- [Whoever] gets angry about objectification, but then I see she wears makeup and dresses attractively, what a hypocrite
- Why are you all so upset, it's only a [video game/tv show/movie/comic book/etc.]
Of course, I just gave it to duck to deal with, so that problem should be going away now.
I can has cheezburger, yes?
No. I cannot in good faith agree with this course of action. Not only does it create the worst kind of toxic vitriol whenever any form of reasonable debate is wont to take place it speaks to the worst kind of mentality in relation to how the public at large reacts to anything new in a discussion or how opinions based on facts are interpreted. The divisive nature of our current political process here in the U.S. stems from this and is one of the major reasons why I ended up not voting for anyone in the previous election.
Fuck that noise.
FFXIV - Milliardo Beoulve/Sargatanas
He's already been banned, but will do next time!
Your wording seemed to imply that you weren't a feminist yourself.
You can't remain neutral. Remaining neutral puts you with the status quo, which is against us.
I'd like to think that gender equality isn't a "for us or against us" type of thing, but it very much is. You don't have to be vocal about it, but without considering gender equality in every social interaction you're perpetuating gender stereotypes (ie misogyny). This puts someone in the other camp.
Now there may be some of us that occasionally lack tact, but we've just grown bitter from the demeaning norm. The only ones who I think are truly problematic are those who seek to exclude heterosexual white males, and those who dismiss other causes and convergent perspectives. As I said before: no progressive movement is really monolithic. A small number of misguided proponents doesn't invalidate our argument. Especially when you put their everyday interactions with a hurtful status quo in perspective.
I'm not sure if objectification is wrong in every context myself. It could be, or it may have some use as a form of artistic expression or parody far removed from the norm. I really don't know.
But to be on topic, I agree that it has to be everybody sitting down and working out a solution together. Fighting against each other just leads to more Dragon's Crowns and more fighting.
I can has cheezburger, yes?
I don't know. A Fox-like approach that uses and foments populist outrage might not be so bad if it stood on a foundation of rigorous and uncompromising commitment to the truth. Or, at the very least, the absolute best information out there.
This may be getting ahead of the immediate goals of this thread, but to what extent should we account for plain old consumer apathy when we talk about games with good representation?
If the ideal in this case is that the player realizes what a great contribution to the game Elizabeth makes, then I don't buy Bosman's logic about the cover, because not everyone will be receiving "the same message." Not everyone will play the game with an open mind, or to completion, or even with their full attention, and not everyone will appreciate what Elizabeth brings to the table. So why bother trying to appeal to someone who's making those kind of snap judgments habitually if they don't get what you're advocating?
Don't the benefits outweigh the risks to put Elizabeth out there for other receptive individuals who 1.) Don't have a strong established position on gender issues and 2.) See games as fun, but aren't used to having games affect them in meaningful ways?
I feel that many of my friends fall into this group. They enjoy games, but don't necessarily play them to completion, and in most cases would rather play multiplayer games because of the social aspect of them. For the most part, character art or motivation are going to be incidental to the immediate fun they have playing them. But I doubt that a cover more like this (original link) would turn them away from it, and might help sell them on it.
I realize this may be a nonissue if we assume those people aren't going to be interested in the game anyway, but I'm curious to get others' opinions.
Ka-Chung!
Ka-Chung!
Ok I only just finished watching this, and I hope everyone in this thread gives this a view. Some of the speakers are clearly not used to public speaking so there are a lot of "ums", but it's really worth watching, especially for Brenda Romero's part at the end.
how convenient for the developers that the backstory they designed allows them to put breasts on the character they designed.
It more serves to satisfy the curiosity of why Argonians look different every game. PS, the Elder Scrolls series goes back much further than even the ability to make characters look sexy, so I would hold up a bit on the conspiracy theories regarding the lore.
It's a bit of a tinfoil hat position. I mean, if you want to see how far the rabbit hole goes, be my guest- http://www.reddit.com/r/teslore/
I love the Elder Scrolls series and I can't make heads nor tails of most of that board's discussions.
the Elder Scrolls games are actually some of the best for staying away from unnecessarily sexy character design, apart from some boob-plate issues.
I'm sorry. Are you saying that the argonian design is sexist? Really?
What happened to Jill?
OH SHIT, Epic put a female on the box!
Wait, she's playable in Sigma, right? Hrm.
Still, now I'm thinking about Rachel's design, and I'm not liking the memory
*jiggle jiggle*
But yes, she's Ryu's companion on his adventure and she is playable in Sigma.
It contains the same underlying tones that every sexist character design does. Why do lizard people need boobs? I don't care about whatever in-universe justification they have - they wrote that shit themselves.
The same thing goes for the Khajit. Why do the Khajit females need two humanoid breasts? Cats don't have that!