Armageddonbound, you were never interested in any level of civil discourse, or you would have given some degree of evidence of having read the thread first. In particular, I note how you claimed people were avoiding arguments and then ignored this post I wrote to you right here, addressing that argument. So forgive me if I am not going to worry overly much about you matyring yourself.
Missing one post by you does not mean someone isn't interested in discourse. It could possibly mean that they missed it because of how fast attack the vultures are in this thread or any number of things. I've been insulted in a terrible way for daring to have a different opinion than the creator of this thread. Take a look in the mirror.
Yours, sir, is not a well informed opinion. It's an opinion based in ignorance, from within your privileged bubble. And it's an opinion you come here stuffing down our throats while yelling "here's the evangelical truth! Open your eyes! You've been blind!" So excuse me if I disregard you as a lunatic.
Or you could prove me wrong pretty easily: shut up, sit down and listen. Maybe you'll learn why your "opinion" is not worth anything.
Oh, also if you're gonna go, go. Don't announce you're leaving and the make pretend "walking away sounds" just to come back. It makes you look silly.
After reading through a few pages I just kinda have to ask, why do the creators of Brink need to give a reason for not including women characters? Forcing the option isn't a great way to address the issue. I'd say it is best to just praise the games that do it and allow others to do their own thing, there is a place and a market for everything. While I am male I'm not upset about the choice to make remember me a female protagonist, it was their design decision. I understand there are much less options for women who want to play as women, but I think it does far more to talk about (and buy) the ones that do it well, rather than make the claim that everyone should always give the option to play as either gender. What about the need for androgynous characters for those that identify as gender neutral? I hate slippery slope arguments, but you are never going to please everyone 100% of the time. Game developers should be able to create and continue creating male protagonists without the shouts of 'sexism' being thrown about.
Let's face it a lot of this is the fact that publishers are out to make money, the more characters you have to design for costs more money. If they feel like the possibility of alienating individuals who feel the need to play as their own gender makes more market sense than the cost of creating those customizations, then that is what they are going to do. Businesses make these kind of decisions quite a bit(customer perception over cost analysis), I'll bet some of the designers of games you might mention with this problem wanted to include female models, but were told it wasn't worth the perceived cost. While you might think of that as a 'bad' thing, it is why the publisher is there.
no you know what i am fucking sick of this logic
IT'S NOT AN 'OPTION'
NO. NO NO NO NO.
it's not an 'extra' to make your game more welcoming to 50% of humanity. it's just not. it's common fucking sense.
I really don't see the reason for this line of thought. Why aren't we complaining about them not releasing Iron-woman 3 this weekend along side Iron-man 3?
Thats a misleading statistic and you know it. What percentage of the genders games that cost more than 1.99? What percentage buy games that have depictions of human forms? What percentage own and purchased their own gaming system? How many systems do they own? How many games per system?
So many pages of people avoiding the fact that the only problem seems to be that woman create/play/buy video games a lot less than men.
There is nothing wrong with sexualization, there's nothing wrong with having the avatars of violence being depicted more often than not as male. If you are upset with either of those things, add to the examples in ways you find appealing, or don't. Dictating what should be created is wrong. The answer to a lack of art you like is "more art".
Too many of the arguments are boiling down to "some game designers aren't as creative as I feel they should be". No shit?
Nope. Welcome to the thread, I recommend reading the OP.
There is a problem with sexualization when it is the norm for a specific gender.
No one has said they should be able to dictate what others create outside of telling someone what they think.
Harmful art doesn't cease to be harmful simply through the creation of other, better art.
There's nothing wrong with calling shitty design shitty.
I don't see the norm for a particular gender being much more than oversimplifications of real humans because of limitations of certain media its forms. Princess peach could be a victim in Super Mario Brothers, or a powerful ruler....Mario could be a violent man with nothing but murder in his eyes....but guess what it's an 8 bit video game without any real story.
and yes people have said they should be able to dictate what others create, you might not be doing it, but its happening.
What does your first sentence even mean? Is this a biological argument? What is a "real human" and what do you mean by "oversimplification"? That men tend to be heroes so no duh Mario is a hero? And women tend to be helpless so no duh Princess is kidnapped? This has got to be a troll or something. Princess Peach is a victim in Super Mario Brothers...she gets kidnapped.
My first sentence means that some games are old, they are very limited in what they can represent because of technology. A few pixels is an oversimplification of the human form. Also 10 lines or less of text in these older games are an oversimplification of the personalities involved. Some games don't even feature humans. I implied the depiction of mario as a violent killer is hurtful to men. The depiction of Peach as his matriarchal overload is damning. These impressions are as valid as any others for a game that contains no story.
Pretty sure even 8-bit Nintendo could display text, thus negating any technological "oversimplifications" in the process. Unless you want to argue that books oversimplify as well? Is your argument that the limits of technology are the reason for gender disparities in videogames? Really? Because I have no idea what your argument is through all this abstract clutter.
Plus, how is Peach a matriarchal overlord? Mario a murderous machine? Don't you even find both of these descriptions as laden with sexist overtones? Eh, nevermind. These are just distractions from the actual issue at hand.
Yes 8-bit games could display text. The game examples we are using dont have much however, because they are action adventure games. How is Peach a matriachal overlord? How is mario a murderous machine with no thought for his own well being that both lives and dies (billions of times) for no other purpose than his overlord? How indeed. How can we jump to conclusions about these characters with such little narrative to go on.
Maybe you should re-read the game manual as pointed out earlier.
...The only one who can lift the spell on the Mushroom People and bring them back to life is the Mushroom Kingdom’s Princess Peach. She is currently in the clutches of Great Demon King Koopa. Mario has stepped up to defeat the Turtle Tribe, save Princess Peach, and restore peace to the Mushroom Kingdom...
What's that again, about doing this just for "his" overlord?
Her dominance and agency supersedes his on such a level that not only is she his matriarchal overlord, but his god-ruler. If he ever wants to see his friends again he must give his very life for her. It also implies that she has such power, that she is most likely capable of freeing herself, and is merely playing at being a prisoner to watch Mario (a veritable Jobe) suffer for her amusement. For someone over the power of life and death should be able to escape mere stone walls.
Shut it down, folks. We're done here.
+2
AegeriTiny wee bacteriumsPlateau of LengRegistered Userregular
I've been considering posting specific criticisms (and/or elaborations upon) of the 'male power fantasy' and 'damel' arguments in this thread for a while, but damn armageddonbround you are making me facepalm.
Please do.
For the record, I don't think it's inherently sexist but it is another one of those tile + tile + tile = mosaic things all over again. I also hardly entirely agree with Anita (or others) but I still think the basic explanation and idea is more than worth while considering. I think of it less in terms of "Needs to be rescued is terrible and sexist" and more "Having a lack of their own agency at all is the problem".
I mean hey there must not be any sexism if you ignore and hand wave away all the sexism.
I mean it's impossible for someone to superimpose sexism onto something that does not actually contain the sexims, because I'm the one doing it right?
Video games with narrative and bigger structures ie not puzzle games etc. are created played and bought by fewer woman than men. That's the only conclusion that has been proven in these threads.
Do women get treated poorly in the work place of video game creation? I don't know, i've only seen anecdotal evidence for each side. It's very possible however. I know male friends that work in childcare and are treated terribly, it may be because they are the minority in their field. These things can very well be problems that exist. One gender being treated poorly in a workplace because they are the minority. I can support efforts to fix that. I cannot support efforts at content controls or bullying however.
Gotta go. Enjoy the echo chamber that you have created by insulting and driving out any dissenters. It's terribly ironic given the issue you claim to support. (this is not just directed to Quid).
Armageddon, if a female friend of yours tell you she's been raped, do you question her? Do you go "are you sure it's not just a misunderstanding?". And then when she tells you she was really raped you say "do you have any evidence?".
I can see that frowning Waluigi face from afar ... goodness.
I was just thinking about posting a tangent about the Pokemon games and how gender is used in them (both in a positive and negative way) and this ... several page discussion spawned.
I'm so sorry.
0
AegeriTiny wee bacteriumsPlateau of LengRegistered Userregular
edited May 2013
Armageddonbound, doesn't it suck to feel like you are a minority opinion amongst a hostile group?
Congratulations, you now have experienced in a small tiny insignificant corner of the gaming sphere on the Internet what the daily reality is for a woman almost everywhere else. Well except we aren't threatening you with sexual violence, or actually insulting you beyond pointing out how ridiculous what you are saying is, or asking you to get your genitals out or well, nothing like that. Okay, you experienced nothing absolutely like what a woman can go through on the Internet whatsoever, but still.
I can only hope you found this an eye opening experience and will consider what it means to be a minority opinion (even though sexist views are in fact the majority elsewhere) was like. Except imagine like this is what it's like all the time and people like you say "Well it doesn't matter if someone told you over XBLA to go make them a sandwich or to get your tits out, your anecdotal experiences aren't worth anything". Maybe, just maybe, you will have a glimmer of understanding what being a minority opinion is like.
Armageddonbound, I don't think you understand what the idea of a systemic problem is. Taken in a vacuum, very few of these games on their own are problematic. When you look at them as a whole, however, trends emerge, and they tend not to be positive for women. Going back to your original post, you said:
So many pages of people avoiding the fact that the only problem seems to be that woman create/play/buy video games a lot less than men.
Did you stop to ask yourself why women create/play/buy video games a lot less than men? Could it possibly be because they feel unwelcome due to the content of games, the depiction of female characters in games, and / or the way women are treated by the community? Being bombarded with games that don't allow for female player characters, or having female NPCs frequently being sexualized, or having female playable characters in party RPGs but having them be healers or support charcters, or off-screen, being harassed for daring to be a female who plays mainstream games, or being told that the games you do like are "casual" and not "real games"... can you see how that would lead to women not creating/playing/buying games as much as men?
There is nothing wrong with sexualization,
Agreed, in the sense that individual examples of sexualization aren't inherently bad. However, do you think there is a problem when it's always one gender that's being sexualized, and that they're being sexualized constantly, and frequently in ways that are contradictory to the plot of the games, suggesting that they are only being sexualized for one particular audience?
The answer to a lack of art you like is "more art".
Given that this is all commercial art that's meant to create a profit, there are finite resources to the amount of art that can be created. "More art" isn't particularly a great answer, especially when developers and publishers seem to be convinced that their current course of action is acceptable.
Armageddonbound, I don't think you understand what the idea of a systemic problem is. Taken in a vacuum, very few of these games on their own are problematic. When you look at them as a whole, however, trends emerge, and they tend not to be positive for women.
this is very important
lotta people think sexism only exists in deliberate, conscious acts
more often it has to do with harmful attitudes ingrained in society
all these anecdotes from women working the industry add up, every crappy depiction or lack therof of women in games adds up, and it all feeds back into a system that is adverse to women seeking to work in the industry which leads to continually bad depictions of women in video games which feeds back into people's attitudes inside and outside the industry which makes it adverse to women seeking to work in the industry and so on and so forth
Posts
Yours, sir, is not a well informed opinion. It's an opinion based in ignorance, from within your privileged bubble. And it's an opinion you come here stuffing down our throats while yelling "here's the evangelical truth! Open your eyes! You've been blind!" So excuse me if I disregard you as a lunatic.
Or you could prove me wrong pretty easily: shut up, sit down and listen. Maybe you'll learn why your "opinion" is not worth anything.
Oh, also if you're gonna go, go. Don't announce you're leaving and the make pretend "walking away sounds" just to come back. It makes you look silly.
Shut it down, folks. We're done here.
Please do.
For the record, I don't think it's inherently sexist but it is another one of those tile + tile + tile = mosaic things all over again. I also hardly entirely agree with Anita (or others) but I still think the basic explanation and idea is more than worth while considering. I think of it less in terms of "Needs to be rescued is terrible and sexist" and more "Having a lack of their own agency at all is the problem".
I mean it's impossible for someone to superimpose sexism onto something that does not actually contain the sexims, because I'm the one doing it right?
Video games with narrative and bigger structures ie not puzzle games etc. are created played and bought by fewer woman than men. That's the only conclusion that has been proven in these threads.
Do women get treated poorly in the work place of video game creation? I don't know, i've only seen anecdotal evidence for each side. It's very possible however. I know male friends that work in childcare and are treated terribly, it may be because they are the minority in their field. These things can very well be problems that exist. One gender being treated poorly in a workplace because they are the minority. I can support efforts to fix that. I cannot support efforts at content controls or bullying however.
Gotta go. Enjoy the echo chamber that you have created by insulting and driving out any dissenters. It's terribly ironic given the issue you claim to support. (this is not just directed to Quid).
Because that's what you're doing here.
I can see that frowning Waluigi face from afar ... goodness.
I was just thinking about posting a tangent about the Pokemon games and how gender is used in them (both in a positive and negative way) and this ... several page discussion spawned.
I'm so sorry.
Congratulations, you now have experienced in a small tiny insignificant corner of the gaming sphere on the Internet what the daily reality is for a woman almost everywhere else. Well except we aren't threatening you with sexual violence, or actually insulting you beyond pointing out how ridiculous what you are saying is, or asking you to get your genitals out or well, nothing like that. Okay, you experienced nothing absolutely like what a woman can go through on the Internet whatsoever, but still.
I can only hope you found this an eye opening experience and will consider what it means to be a minority opinion (even though sexist views are in fact the majority elsewhere) was like. Except imagine like this is what it's like all the time and people like you say "Well it doesn't matter if someone told you over XBLA to go make them a sandwich or to get your tits out, your anecdotal experiences aren't worth anything". Maybe, just maybe, you will have a glimmer of understanding what being a minority opinion is like.
Did you stop to ask yourself why women create/play/buy video games a lot less than men? Could it possibly be because they feel unwelcome due to the content of games, the depiction of female characters in games, and / or the way women are treated by the community? Being bombarded with games that don't allow for female player characters, or having female NPCs frequently being sexualized, or having female playable characters in party RPGs but having them be healers or support charcters, or off-screen, being harassed for daring to be a female who plays mainstream games, or being told that the games you do like are "casual" and not "real games"... can you see how that would lead to women not creating/playing/buying games as much as men?
Agreed, in the sense that individual examples of sexualization aren't inherently bad. However, do you think there is a problem when it's always one gender that's being sexualized, and that they're being sexualized constantly, and frequently in ways that are contradictory to the plot of the games, suggesting that they are only being sexualized for one particular audience?
Given that this is all commercial art that's meant to create a profit, there are finite resources to the amount of art that can be created. "More art" isn't particularly a great answer, especially when developers and publishers seem to be convinced that their current course of action is acceptable.
3DS FC: 0817-3759-2788
this is very important
lotta people think sexism only exists in deliberate, conscious acts
more often it has to do with harmful attitudes ingrained in society
all these anecdotes from women working the industry add up, every crappy depiction or lack therof of women in games adds up, and it all feeds back into a system that is adverse to women seeking to work in the industry which leads to continually bad depictions of women in video games which feeds back into people's attitudes inside and outside the industry which makes it adverse to women seeking to work in the industry and so on and so forth
geth, close the thread