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Anyone care to talk about video games and feminism?
not_withstanding
Registered User new member
Registered User new member
Hey, this may seem like a bit of an odd request but I was hoping that some of the good folk here might be interested in helping me out with a project I’m working on.
I’m a gamer and a college student in Oregon, and this term I’m taking an introduction to Women’s Studies course. Just to give you a bit of background on what we’re studying, we’ve been doing a sort of general overview on feminism and examining how underlying sexism, racism, classism and other forms of oppression exist in our society, how they affect groups of people and individuals, and what can be done to lessen their negative effects. The reason my project brings me here to a video game forum is because in my experience, the area in my life from which I (a female gamer) feel I witness and receive the most sexist behavior is when I interact with male gamers (and also occasionally female gamers who, for whatever reason, perpetuate sexist sentiment). Now, please understand, it’s not my intention to put male gamers under attack, especially not on an individual or personal level—rather, the purpose of my project is to examine possibilities as to why these kinds of behaviors and viewpoints are so prevalent and to see what gamers as individuals think of social issues such as sexism, racism, etc. in the context of video games and the gaming community.
In other words, I’m hoping to instigate a sort of feminist discussion here on a video game forum, a place which I imagine doesn’t hear about feminism very often. I want to pose questions about video games and the gaming community and how they relate to feminism.
To clear the air (since I know the term “feminism” isn’t usually easily swallowed for most people), I want to use the main definition for feminism that we’ve been using in my course, as coined by the feminist writer, bell hooks:
Feminism is a movement to end sexism, sexual exploitation, and oppression.
So when I use the term “feminism”, that’s what I’m talking about. An example of this in video games would be the tendency to objectify women, which is sexual exploitation, therefore is considered less-than-ideal by feminists. That out of the way, I’d like to pose some questions for people here on the forum to address—I want to know what you think, what experiences you’ve had in regards to whatever the question is discussing, examples that either support or contradict a theory, so on and so forth. I also invite you to come up with questions or observations of your own, or to respond to things that others say. Keep in mind, I’m not really interested in being told what you think I want to hear—I’m interested in knowing what people actually think, so I invite you all to give honest opinions and not worry about offending me.
Do keep in mind, though, that I’m trying to instigate intelligent and meaningful conversations. Responses like “Stereotypes come from somewhere” aren’t really useful to my project or to such conversations in general (because stereotypes DO come from somewhere—they are perpetuated by our society in order to maintain the status quo of the social “norm” between sexes, races, classes, sexual orientations, and other social groups, and this should be kept in mind any time you notice stereotypes). Also, although I understand that it’s easy to get angry at someone for having a different view of a particular topic, please try to keep it civil—the point of this is to share ideas with one another, and that becomes really difficult in an aggressive or hostile conversation.
Also, I’d like to skip over the general observation of women being commonly objectified in video games. Taking the time to discuss a topic that has already been discussed to death (and is so broad and generalizing on top of that) just seems like a waste of time. I’d like to dig a little deeper, and to discuss other social groups aside in addition to women, and also allow some room for recognizing video games that don’t objectify women.
All that being said, I’d like to propose some questions for you to consider. Feel free to answer any one you desire (or multiple, if you choose), or to address a particular topic of your own that I may have overlooked. Remember, I’m not looking for sugar-coated responses—I’m interested in hearing what is true for each of you. The purpose is to find out what gamers really think, and hopefully to get you all sharing new ideas with each other, too.
Here are some questions I'd like to pose:
• In regards to how the video game community (gamers, journalists, game designers, etc.) view women, consider comments or observations about male and female video game characters you’ve heard others make or have made yourself. When the character is male, what kind of comments are made about him—what aspects of his character are most important? When the character is female, what do gamers consider to be her most important aspects? What if the character is gender-ambiguous?
• In your gaming experience, what characteristics (physically, mentally, or emotionally) are commonly portrayed as ideal in male characters? How about in female characters?
• When playing video games with others, does the sex of any of the people you are playing with change how you behave? Does knowing the sex of someone you are playing with in an online game change your behavior toward them? Does it vary depending on what game you’re playing? Do you behave the same regardless of the sex of the people playing with you? Or have you never noticed a change in behavior?
• In your gaming experience, how are homosexuals, bisexuals, or other non-heterosexual portrayed? What about characters who fall outside of the categories of “male” or “female”? How do you personally react when you see such characters? How have you noticed other gamers reacting?
• Have you noticed, or do you believe, that a game’s nationality of origin may have some impact on how sexual, racial, religious and other minorities are portrayed? If so, what kind of differences of this nature might you have noticed between games that originated in American/Western culture, and games that originated in other cultures?
• In your gaming experience, how are racial minorities portrayed? Again, do you believe that the cultural origin of the game may have some relation to how racial minorities are portrayed? How do you personally react when you see such characters, and how have you noticed other gamers reacting?
• In your gaming experience, have you played any games where you have noticed anti-sexist, anti-racist, anti-heterosexist (i.e., anti-homophobic or gay-friendly), or anti-classist themes? What about the opposite—any games where you have noticed overtly sexist, racist, heterosexist, or classist themes? Do such themes affect your opinion of the game as whole? If you know before playing a game that it contains any of these themes, do you feel more/less inclined to play it?
Again, if you can think of any other topics to discuss, feel free to give opinions or give questions for readers to consider. Thanks to all of you who are willing to take the time to participate with this, and hopefully doing so will prove to be a beneficial experience for you, too.
Thanks again, and I hope you all have a lovely evening.
-Jasmine
I’m a gamer and a college student in Oregon, and this term I’m taking an introduction to Women’s Studies course. Just to give you a bit of background on what we’re studying, we’ve been doing a sort of general overview on feminism and examining how underlying sexism, racism, classism and other forms of oppression exist in our society, how they affect groups of people and individuals, and what can be done to lessen their negative effects. The reason my project brings me here to a video game forum is because in my experience, the area in my life from which I (a female gamer) feel I witness and receive the most sexist behavior is when I interact with male gamers (and also occasionally female gamers who, for whatever reason, perpetuate sexist sentiment). Now, please understand, it’s not my intention to put male gamers under attack, especially not on an individual or personal level—rather, the purpose of my project is to examine possibilities as to why these kinds of behaviors and viewpoints are so prevalent and to see what gamers as individuals think of social issues such as sexism, racism, etc. in the context of video games and the gaming community.
In other words, I’m hoping to instigate a sort of feminist discussion here on a video game forum, a place which I imagine doesn’t hear about feminism very often. I want to pose questions about video games and the gaming community and how they relate to feminism.
To clear the air (since I know the term “feminism” isn’t usually easily swallowed for most people), I want to use the main definition for feminism that we’ve been using in my course, as coined by the feminist writer, bell hooks:
Feminism is a movement to end sexism, sexual exploitation, and oppression.
So when I use the term “feminism”, that’s what I’m talking about. An example of this in video games would be the tendency to objectify women, which is sexual exploitation, therefore is considered less-than-ideal by feminists. That out of the way, I’d like to pose some questions for people here on the forum to address—I want to know what you think, what experiences you’ve had in regards to whatever the question is discussing, examples that either support or contradict a theory, so on and so forth. I also invite you to come up with questions or observations of your own, or to respond to things that others say. Keep in mind, I’m not really interested in being told what you think I want to hear—I’m interested in knowing what people actually think, so I invite you all to give honest opinions and not worry about offending me.
Do keep in mind, though, that I’m trying to instigate intelligent and meaningful conversations. Responses like “Stereotypes come from somewhere” aren’t really useful to my project or to such conversations in general (because stereotypes DO come from somewhere—they are perpetuated by our society in order to maintain the status quo of the social “norm” between sexes, races, classes, sexual orientations, and other social groups, and this should be kept in mind any time you notice stereotypes). Also, although I understand that it’s easy to get angry at someone for having a different view of a particular topic, please try to keep it civil—the point of this is to share ideas with one another, and that becomes really difficult in an aggressive or hostile conversation.
Also, I’d like to skip over the general observation of women being commonly objectified in video games. Taking the time to discuss a topic that has already been discussed to death (and is so broad and generalizing on top of that) just seems like a waste of time. I’d like to dig a little deeper, and to discuss other social groups aside in addition to women, and also allow some room for recognizing video games that don’t objectify women.
All that being said, I’d like to propose some questions for you to consider. Feel free to answer any one you desire (or multiple, if you choose), or to address a particular topic of your own that I may have overlooked. Remember, I’m not looking for sugar-coated responses—I’m interested in hearing what is true for each of you. The purpose is to find out what gamers really think, and hopefully to get you all sharing new ideas with each other, too.
Here are some questions I'd like to pose:
• In regards to how the video game community (gamers, journalists, game designers, etc.) view women, consider comments or observations about male and female video game characters you’ve heard others make or have made yourself. When the character is male, what kind of comments are made about him—what aspects of his character are most important? When the character is female, what do gamers consider to be her most important aspects? What if the character is gender-ambiguous?
• In your gaming experience, what characteristics (physically, mentally, or emotionally) are commonly portrayed as ideal in male characters? How about in female characters?
• When playing video games with others, does the sex of any of the people you are playing with change how you behave? Does knowing the sex of someone you are playing with in an online game change your behavior toward them? Does it vary depending on what game you’re playing? Do you behave the same regardless of the sex of the people playing with you? Or have you never noticed a change in behavior?
• In your gaming experience, how are homosexuals, bisexuals, or other non-heterosexual portrayed? What about characters who fall outside of the categories of “male” or “female”? How do you personally react when you see such characters? How have you noticed other gamers reacting?
• Have you noticed, or do you believe, that a game’s nationality of origin may have some impact on how sexual, racial, religious and other minorities are portrayed? If so, what kind of differences of this nature might you have noticed between games that originated in American/Western culture, and games that originated in other cultures?
• In your gaming experience, how are racial minorities portrayed? Again, do you believe that the cultural origin of the game may have some relation to how racial minorities are portrayed? How do you personally react when you see such characters, and how have you noticed other gamers reacting?
• In your gaming experience, have you played any games where you have noticed anti-sexist, anti-racist, anti-heterosexist (i.e., anti-homophobic or gay-friendly), or anti-classist themes? What about the opposite—any games where you have noticed overtly sexist, racist, heterosexist, or classist themes? Do such themes affect your opinion of the game as whole? If you know before playing a game that it contains any of these themes, do you feel more/less inclined to play it?
Again, if you can think of any other topics to discuss, feel free to give opinions or give questions for readers to consider. Thanks to all of you who are willing to take the time to participate with this, and hopefully doing so will prove to be a beneficial experience for you, too.
Thanks again, and I hope you all have a lovely evening.
-Jasmine
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CpoomycJFIQ
Actually, it's regularly discussed on this particular sub forum.
Well, that's pretty closed minded. Especially because, if you had taken the time to look around, you would have seen that this forum (ESPECIALLY this sub-forum) is populated by quite a few people who are outspoken femenists, and many more who do not necesarily identify as such, but still espouse views on equality that are very much in line with feminism.
The assumption that gamers are generally a group of men who don't care about sexism is honestly pretty sexist in and of itself.
Feminists also hated L4D, because Zoe was just an avatar with breasts, equally capable as the boys and no comment made to her sex.
But a game I'm currently playing which is at times painfully sexist is Star Ocean: The Last Hope for Xbox 360. It's a JRPG, so maybe that explains half of it, but the girl, Reimi, is so horribly helpless. When she levels up she says "Hopefully now I can be of some help!" And in a number of scenes, something will happen and she will turn to the male lead and beg him to explain what happened despite the fact that they both have the same exact knowledge of the situation. Ugh. It's an ok RPG besides that, though.
Honestly, a more interesting topic to me would be the broad umbrella term of Feminism. The various waves of Feminism make for a confusing term. Different people mean different things when they say Feminism, and when you say you are a Feminist you often have to explain what you aren't before you explain what you are.
Except we're very aware of it. You really probably shouldn't open with "I'm smarter and more aware of gender studies than every single one of you"
Except that's a single restrictive philosophy. You don't get to say "Let's have a discussion in my very specific view, where we assume I'm right about everything". Discussions don't work that way.
So in your enlightened position where you think about feminisim, while "us gamers" don't, you still don't seem to understand that a certain group of people who share a certain trait don't necessarily think all alike?
Oh come on, seriously? When watching TV, when watching movies, when watching theater, or opera, or viewing art, or, hey, while we're at it, while doing anything ever the sex of other people involved will change behavior. What does this have to do with gaming and feminism?
It's probably not a good idea to say "Hello, gamers! I am a college student who is looking to inject serious discussion among you people who never have that! GAMERS!
Or can we talk about how Crimson Viper has boots that shoot fire and electro-knuckles and regularly beats up the main boss of Street Fighter 2?
Hey, if we want to talk about stereotypes...
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Not just entertainment.
I go to a bar, and the girl bartenders are wearing low-cut shirts. A girl enjoys dressing up and looking pretty, and guys like her looking pretty too.
So, what, reality is sexist, since we're assuming the medium has some influence?
The entire idea that entertainment or games specifically are different is ludicrous.
Or how you can jiggle boobs in Ninja Gaiden 2 on the PS3 with the motion controls in the controller?
And save topless girls as the equally topless Conan!
Seriously though, video games are pretty egalitarian in their description of the sexes in that there's no unattractive guys, either. Well, except for Mario maybe. Also, I would wonder how many games have featured stripped to the waist guys with rippling pectorals v. women baring it all.
So to cherry-pick the gaming world's affinity for misogeny is missing the bigger picture. A key demographic (if not THE key demographic) of the industry is the anti-social, sexually repressed, maturity-deprived crowd. Of course they like seeing big tittied girls blowing stuff up.
You might even say it's less sexist, because most of the female characters get all the advantages of actually being men.
Peach wasn't a beauty queen in the first Mario either.
There are plenty of ugly dudes in video games.
But how many are the heroes? There are plenty of ugly chicks in video games too, but never as the heroine or love interest.
I'm coming up with Chakan, Mario, MK1 Shang Tsung (boy did they fix that quick), the dude in Manhunt, arguably the guy in GTA4, and what else?
Ugly women in games has what, Fat Princess?
Regardless, the fact that the epitome of the body shape is used more frequently than not for both sexes isn't a unique thing for video games. When was the last time you saw a genuinely unattractive woman in a pen and paper RPG book, or a CCG, or movies? I mean with like ugly wobbling thigh fat kind of ugly, not Charlize Theron in Monster kind of ugly.
And this post hits the nail on the head.
I mean - "video games aren't sexist! They're just like these comics and RPGs that I like!" - that's not exactly flawless-victory logic right there.
Comics and RPGS? You realize you're the first person to bring up those specific media, right?
You must, because it'd be stupid not to.
Video Game Male:
I mean look at that fucking arm. LOOK AT THAT FUCKING ARM. His god damn arm is bigger then his fucking head. Jesus fuckshit.
Except that there are different ways of drawing attractive. The issue is that many female characters are drawn to be titillating, while male characters aren't. For example, would you say that Duke Nukem is drawn/rendered in a mannerthat makes him attractive? Or would you say that he's drawn in a manner that emphasizes his stereotypical "masculine" attributes, but not necessarily in a nammer to make him attractive to the opposite gender? Now look at female characters, and look at how they're drawn/rendered.
There is a difference, and it's pretty big.
Yes. Tell me all about how stupid it would be, Khavall.
To be fair, I mentioned comics, albeit only an as an example of how a wide variety of other mediums are no less sexist as video games. I'm not really sure where the implication that RPGs are sexist comes from, though.
The thing is, the purpose of these posts are to demonstrate how video games are no more sexist then any other medium (not just comics or RPGS, any medium). I don't understand how that's bad logic.
Duke Nukem is quite possibly the worst fucking example possibly by any stretch of the imagination. Duke Nukem is a parody of beefcake male characters, and is designed not to be attractive to anyone ever. Duke Nukem is specifically the "Look at these male characters in video games, they wear beaters and sunglasses, they will bone anything female in sight, and they will shoot up anything not female in sight" character
In Mass Effect, all of the funny looking aliens are male, as far as I'm aware. Certainly the ones in your party are. They're at least arguably heroes. Contrast that with the female aliens we see: asari all look like nicely-proportioned women, and while Tali doesn't quite have the body of an attractive woman, she comes close enough to pass.
There are lots of ridiculously attractive characters. Alastair in Dragon Age was purpose-built for the female cast (and is consequently one of the most popular characters with both sexes). Shepard in Mass Effect is a facial scan of a supermodel. Bill was a little old, but all the characters in the original Left 4 Dead were attractive in their own right.
EDIT this is actually really interesting - an early shot of the l4d crew
Louis was a lot, well, "blacker", Francis was a beefier biker, and Bill was a little more haggard. I guess they softened all the characters from their original design heh.
EDIT2 here's the final L4D crew:
Louis is now an office man, Francis lost weight and muscles, Bill lost his flak jacket and looks more fatherly. Zoe changed a little too - not sure how to describe it. Pretty interesting stuff. I actually prefer the earlier concept for the characters, especially Louis and Bill.
If a dude is being a sexist prick, he's usually either pretty young or very immature for his age, and if he's being a sexist prick he's usually also being a racist prick and a dickhole in general. He's giving everyone on the server shit for having the nerve to not be white and for not playing exactly as he does or as he wants you to. So, no one really likes him and he should just go back to Xbox live chat where he belongs and is probably from anyways. I don't think that unless you only play on public servers with strangers that you're really going to be getting crap for being a girl these days anymore. If you're dealing with a White Knight I think you're really just dealing with someone who doesn't spend a lot of time with ladies and is entirely unaware of what they are doing. They see us as special. Those White Knights are probably more shocked and amazed that we actually exist than anything else, and it's not a problem for me so long as they back off when I ask them to. They are just lonely.
If you make a female character in a game and they're another Tits McGee I think that dudes notice this and know that this character isn't someone you want to spend time caring about. They are a sex doll, they have no minds of their own and all they know is to bounce their boobs and giggle. This is everything from "that brain-dead slut" token character to random NPCs you see walking around in a village someplace. I don't think this is necessarily a bad thing. Token brain-dead sluts can have a funny personality of their own as a comic relief sometimes and it would take a stupid amount of effort to make every female NPC someone worth caring about especially if they're just supposed to be generic villager #25. I don't think that Dead or Alive beach volleyball is anymore sexist than that stupid, generic Prince Charming from some stupid women's romance novel. If all there was were Prince Charmings I would go gay. They're fake, not real and I can't respect them anymore than my boyfriend can respect Whore #53 in some fantasy rpg.
However when you get characters like Alyx from HL2 or Jade from Beyond Good and Evil, then they're special. Some guys end up half falling in love with them because they appear to be more real. Real girls don't have huge flotation devices as breasts and we got minds of our own. We also don't want to be just that stupid bitch that broke her shoe heel and is completely worthless. I love characters like these because they are strong and empowering women and because I don't actually own high heel shoes.
The only sexism I see is from assholes that people don't really want to play games with already. I don't think that there's a lot of sexism going on in game development either. I tend to only play western titles so I can't really answer your question of my thoughts on something from Japan or whatnot. I think what's important to remember is the ages of the people building these games. Does the average adult male around the ages of 25-35 appear to come off as sexist to you? I think that if it was the 1960s then we would have a problem cause the only women in video games if any would be brainless secretaries. If they were strong at all they would only end up doing something stupid for the male character to fix, and then they would realize their place in the world. When you get games that have no women in it, I have to look at the context of the game before I start shouting sexism. In TF2, look at the time period the game comes from, I don't think there were a lot of women mercenaries at that time. I think we had to take a certain walk first for that.
I might also be an outlier because I think sexism is hilarious. I know a lot of women don't, and what is ok for me might not be ok for anyone else. I don't see Tits McGee as a symbol of sexism, just a symbol of comedy. And masturbation. For Christ's sake they have imaginations of their own, they're going to be thinking of it even if we get rid of characters like her and simply thinking of a women that is nothing but breasts to get yourself off isn't sexist anyways because you're just relieving yourself.
Also, fun to note, Carth of KOTOR was designed to be the perfect male character, after much focus group data. And that's why he's such an annoying, horrible character. Empty and vapid, just full of "Vulnerability" and shit. And he's a completely empty character, just like a female character who consists of nothing but boobs.
Alistair was what Carth should've been. He's popular because not only is he "What women want", but he's a real character outside of that.
Because those other media are also aimed squarely at, and are to an overwhelming degree patronized by, young men, and find themselves under very similar critical scrutiny. Appealing to them for support is sort of like going "my mom thinks I'm the smartest kid in school too!"
Which actually makes him an excellent jumping off point, because (as you pointed out) he hyperaccentuates all the major attributes of your average male video game character. And look at exactly what got emphasized - muscles, virility, promiscuity, a penchant for violence. But what would you get if you hyperaccentuated the attributes of a female video game character? Pretty much boobs mounted on a stick.
Or to put it simply, gamers would want to be Duke. Gamers would want to fuck his female counterpart. Which is the difference rolled up in a nutshell.
Edit: I'm suddenly reminded of the scandal regarding Mirror's Edge, where several promo shots were Photoshopped to make Faith look more stereotypically attractive (basically they gave her a boob job and softened her ethnic features.) Which was incredibly stupid, as Faith's build was athletic for a reason (running all over rooftops - not an environment conductive to large breasts,) and Faith's design had won a lot of praise for being actually, you know, realistic.
Yeah I'm not following your reasoning at fucking all. Who the fuck would want to be a roided out freak looking at a heart attack in a few days, who probably hides awful acne under that shirt and has balls the size of raisins?
Nobody.
EDIT I think if you ran a quick poll about who people would want to be from video game heroes on this board, a loooot of people would say "Gordon Freeman", simply because he isn't a parody of a parody in a parody of a game.
If you think the main character of Planescape: Torment is attractive, you have more issues than just how mainstream gaming reinforces gender stereotypes. :P
Borderlands also has Mordecai, who's not what most folks would call a looker, especially compared to Lilith, who's yet another stereotypical hot chick.
All media is aimed at young men?
really?
Have you seen a modern opera recently? Gyorgi Ligety wrote the opera Le Grand Macabre in 1975 that involves a couple that while in the plot is a heterosexual couple, is played by two women, who through song have orgasms, then decide to go have sex for the entire opera. Then there's a drunk. Then there's an S+M couple where the woman is pretty much a bundle of S+M Sex while the dude is a giant pussy who doesn't reciprocate. The plot is resolved when everyone drinks and has sex.
So, what, Postmodernistic Opera is aimed squarely at, and to an overwhelming degree patronized by young men?