As was foretold, we've added advertisements to the forums! If you have questions, or if you encounter any bugs, please visit this thread: https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/240191/forum-advertisement-faq-and-reports-thread/

A Thread About Sexist Tropes

11617192122

Posts

  • Harry DresdenHarry Dresden Registered User regular
    edited September 2014
    Squidget0 wrote: »
    shryke wrote: »
    Squidget0 wrote: »
    Incenjucar wrote: »
    Alinius133 wrote: »
    I haven't read any Catwoman (haven't read comics in a long while) but isn't part of her actual character that she has intentional sex appeal, that she decided upon, and uses it purposefully to seduce people?

    Because seduction is a real thing that people attempt, so unrealistic drawings and body proportions/poses aside, there's a justification to sexualize that character.

    I would say the same is true of Black Widow as well. She actively uses her sexuality as a weapon, and often uses the fact that she is a woman to trick people into underestimating her. Is that sexist art or just art acknowledging the sexism present in the world?

    Sexist is not "a woman wears a sexy outfit to fight crime."

    Sexist is "women are much more likely to use sexy outfits to fight crime than men are."

    Actually, the sexism here is probably that men can't wear sexy outfits to fight crime, because the concept of a male 'sexy outfit' doesn't really exist in the public consciousness. Everyone always makes some joke about how sexy comics men would have giant codpieces, but I don't think those people are actually attracted to giant codpieces. If you ask 10 different people what a sexy man looks like you'll probably get 10 different answers.

    The idea of a 'sexy' male character is a lot more nebulous. When we see celebrities who get a lot of female attention and fans (say, a Tom Hiddleston or Benedict Cumberbatch), their attractiveness tends to rest more on their perceived personality than solely on their appearance or body type. This isn't because men are shallow, it's because as a society we've created different symbols for sexuality across the genders, and we interpret them in different ways. So even if lots of guys wear silly impractical things (like James Bond in a suit or whatever), it still won't get interpreted the same way as it would on a woman.

    If there were some combination of lines an artist could draw that the vast majority of straight women would interpret immediately as 'sexy guy', you'd probably see those lines drawn a lot. There are always artists willing to pander to an eager crowd. That sequence of lines doesn't exist right now, for a lot of really complicated reasons. It's ultimately a bit of a simplification to say that artists should draw something that we, as a society, have no concept for and haven't expressed any great interest in seeing.

    There's sexy male outfits. Something that's tight and shows off their physique is usually what's used.

    So like, spandex? Doesn't almost every male superhero wear that?

    Let's compare spandex worn by male and female super-heroes.

    superman-costume-456.jpg

    faf35-spider-woman_super.jpg?w=266&h=400

    See the difference?

    Harry Dresden on
  • Undead ScottsmanUndead Scottsman Registered User regular
    edited September 2014
    shryke wrote: »
    Caedwyr wrote: »
    Didn't Marvel have a "Captain Roofie" character?

    The fuck?
    Incenjucar wrote: »
    There's Gambit.

    But then they gave him a date rape power for awhile.

    The fuck??

    Dunno about Gambit, but at one point there were two characters based on Thanatos and Eros made in the Marvel Universe. The Thanatos character became the death-obsessed Thanos, but the Eros character eventually became the swashbuckling Avenger Starfox. His ability was.. well, I'll just let wikipedia explain that one.
    Starfox can psionically stimulate the pleasure centers in nearby people's brains, making them calm and open to suggestion using his persuasion skill. It has been suggested that when in physical contact, and there is direct line of sight between the subject and the target, Starfox can use this euphoria effect to cause a person or persons to become infatuated with him, objects, or people of his choosing or simply to make others feel good while in his presence.

    It was a questionable power with no shortage of controversy. Eventually that controversy was finally addressed head on in Peter David's "She-Hulk" comic where Starfox literally got arrested and put on trial for data rape. Eventually they kind of wussed out by revealing Thanos has secretly modified his power to be always on, even when Starfox thought he wasn't using it, because Thanos wanted to be a dick to his brother. Starfox volunteered to have his power permanently shut off when he discovered this.

    Undead Scottsman on
  • Squidget0Squidget0 Registered User regular
    Squidget0 wrote: »
    Incenjucar wrote: »
    Alinius133 wrote: »
    I haven't read any Catwoman (haven't read comics in a long while) but isn't part of her actual character that she has intentional sex appeal, that she decided upon, and uses it purposefully to seduce people?

    Because seduction is a real thing that people attempt, so unrealistic drawings and body proportions/poses aside, there's a justification to sexualize that character.

    I would say the same is true of Black Widow as well. She actively uses her sexuality as a weapon, and often uses the fact that she is a woman to trick people into underestimating her. Is that sexist art or just art acknowledging the sexism present in the world?

    Sexist is not "a woman wears a sexy outfit to fight crime."

    Sexist is "women are much more likely to use sexy outfits to fight crime than men are."

    Actually, the sexism here is probably that men can't wear sexy outfits to fight crime, because the concept of a male 'sexy outfit' doesn't really exist in the public consciousness. Everyone always makes some joke about how sexy comics men would have giant codpieces, but I don't think those people are actually attracted to giant codpieces. If you ask 10 different people what a sexy man looks like you'll probably get 10 different answers.

    The idea of a 'sexy' male character is a lot more nebulous. When we see celebrities who get a lot of female attention and fans (say, a Tom Hiddleston or Benedict Cumberbatch), their attractiveness tends to rest more on their perceived personality than solely on their appearance or body type. This isn't because men are shallow, it's because as a society we've created different symbols for sexuality across the genders, and we interpret them in different ways. So even if lots of guys wear silly impractical things (like James Bond in a suit or whatever), it still won't get interpreted the same way as it would on a woman.

    If there were some combination of lines an artist could draw that the vast majority of straight women would interpret immediately as 'sexy guy', you'd probably see those lines drawn a lot. There are always artists willing to pander to an eager crowd. That sequence of lines doesn't exist right now, for a lot of really complicated reasons. It's ultimately a bit of a simplification to say that artists should draw something that we, as a society, have no concept for and haven't expressed any great interest in seeing.

    Hiddleson fans aren't strictly liking him for his personality but it helps. Cumberbatch isn't as handsome, same situation with Sherlock. Women and girls like "pretty" people it's just that society has drilled into their heads it's not acceptable to admit that. There are differences, of course, yet they're not so different on that front. Chris Evans and Hemsworth get enormous female attention too, and that is serious Twilight-esque mania based on their sexual appearance. Marvel knows how to hire their sexy Chrises.

    How a male character is sold sexually to a female audience is different to how male characters are generally shown in media, Twilight excelled at this in the movies with Edward and the werewolves. Nightwing is given this by artists like Nicola Scott, in scenes that show off his butt. He's the go-to boy for female fans to drool over in the DCU.

    I'm positive this scene in Guardians was made for the female and gay audience to ogle.

    Guardians-of-the-Galaxy-Chris-Pratt-X400.jpg

    Yeah, I think the Marvel movies (and movies in general) have stronger tools to play with than conventional artists. The "Waking up and brooding at the windowsill while the camera oogles his biceps in the dawn" scene is another classic, and I think Wolverine has had it in every X-men movie.

    But I do think that you have to push it a lot farther and try a lot harder to anywhere close to the same impact as you would with a woman in the same position. A camera positioned behind Spider Man is just behind Spider Man, while a camera shot from behind Catwoman is always an 'ass shot.'

  • Undead ScottsmanUndead Scottsman Registered User regular
    edited September 2014
    Days of Future Past has a full on rear nude scene for wolverine. (Apparently at Jackman's request; he apparently finds the "guy wakes up in boxers after a night of having sex" trope to be dumb.)

    Undead Scottsman on
  • override367override367 ALL minions Registered User regular
    guardians had the starlord scene and even pulled the "gamorra sideboob" scene from the final cut

  • Squidget0Squidget0 Registered User regular
    Squidget0 wrote: »
    shryke wrote: »
    Squidget0 wrote: »
    Incenjucar wrote: »
    Alinius133 wrote: »
    I haven't read any Catwoman (haven't read comics in a long while) but isn't part of her actual character that she has intentional sex appeal, that she decided upon, and uses it purposefully to seduce people?

    Because seduction is a real thing that people attempt, so unrealistic drawings and body proportions/poses aside, there's a justification to sexualize that character.

    I would say the same is true of Black Widow as well. She actively uses her sexuality as a weapon, and often uses the fact that she is a woman to trick people into underestimating her. Is that sexist art or just art acknowledging the sexism present in the world?

    Sexist is not "a woman wears a sexy outfit to fight crime."

    Sexist is "women are much more likely to use sexy outfits to fight crime than men are."

    Actually, the sexism here is probably that men can't wear sexy outfits to fight crime, because the concept of a male 'sexy outfit' doesn't really exist in the public consciousness. Everyone always makes some joke about how sexy comics men would have giant codpieces, but I don't think those people are actually attracted to giant codpieces. If you ask 10 different people what a sexy man looks like you'll probably get 10 different answers.

    The idea of a 'sexy' male character is a lot more nebulous. When we see celebrities who get a lot of female attention and fans (say, a Tom Hiddleston or Benedict Cumberbatch), their attractiveness tends to rest more on their perceived personality than solely on their appearance or body type. This isn't because men are shallow, it's because as a society we've created different symbols for sexuality across the genders, and we interpret them in different ways. So even if lots of guys wear silly impractical things (like James Bond in a suit or whatever), it still won't get interpreted the same way as it would on a woman.

    If there were some combination of lines an artist could draw that the vast majority of straight women would interpret immediately as 'sexy guy', you'd probably see those lines drawn a lot. There are always artists willing to pander to an eager crowd. That sequence of lines doesn't exist right now, for a lot of really complicated reasons. It's ultimately a bit of a simplification to say that artists should draw something that we, as a society, have no concept for and haven't expressed any great interest in seeing.

    There's sexy male outfits. Something that's tight and shows off their physique is usually what's used.

    So like, spandex? Doesn't almost every male superhero wear that?

    Let's compare spandex worn by male and female super-heroes.

    superman-costume-456.jpg

    faf35-spider-woman_super.jpg?w=266&h=400

    See the difference?

    Well, the Superman one on the left is drawn looks like its from the 50s, with inking and stylistic standards matching that time, so there's not a lot of sexy detail to it. The blue dude on the left and the orange lady below are pretty similar, but both are held back from being sexy by weird proportions.

    Blue dude is probably a better design in general (more consistency and focus to him), but both he and orange lady's outfit are skintight and sexy. Physically, they're both about what you'd expect from someone exaggerating the male/female form. The pose is different, but I'm not really sure how you could effectively draw the dude in a 'sexy' pose like she has without it looking silly, while I can easily see how you'd draw the woman in a power pose.

  • PaladinPaladin Registered User regular
    Watchmen pulled a full frontal but nobody really cares

    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.
  • Alinius133Alinius133 Registered User regular
    edited September 2014
    shryke wrote: »
    emnmnme wrote: »
    catwoman leaving her front unzipped like that in the workplace is sexual harassment and she should be fired

    if she wants to walk around all cleavage hanging out when she's out beating people up as her "thing" that's cool, and as a male gaze I appreciate cleavage, or if she's seducing someone hey that's cool too (as long as they're clearly into it).

    but srsly if i was on that superhero team I'd report it to HR

    People don't do this for Black Widow.
    She'll kill you.

    What exactly would you call what Catwoman and Black Widow do when they use sexuality as an opener? Belligerent beguiling? Fatal flustering?
    Catwomanoops_zps0e4dbfdc.jpg

    Do any male characters use sexuality as an opener?
    This was the closest I could find. Or course that leads back to another sexist trope. A sexy woman is one who looks a certain way. A sexy man is more about saying the right things.

    Alinius133 on
  • override367override367 ALL minions Registered User regular
    edited September 2014
    please don't link TVtropes

    override367 on
  • shrykeshryke Member of the Beast Registered User regular
    Squidget0 wrote: »
    Squidget0 wrote: »
    shryke wrote: »
    Squidget0 wrote: »
    Incenjucar wrote: »
    Alinius133 wrote: »
    I haven't read any Catwoman (haven't read comics in a long while) but isn't part of her actual character that she has intentional sex appeal, that she decided upon, and uses it purposefully to seduce people?

    Because seduction is a real thing that people attempt, so unrealistic drawings and body proportions/poses aside, there's a justification to sexualize that character.

    I would say the same is true of Black Widow as well. She actively uses her sexuality as a weapon, and often uses the fact that she is a woman to trick people into underestimating her. Is that sexist art or just art acknowledging the sexism present in the world?

    Sexist is not "a woman wears a sexy outfit to fight crime."

    Sexist is "women are much more likely to use sexy outfits to fight crime than men are."

    Actually, the sexism here is probably that men can't wear sexy outfits to fight crime, because the concept of a male 'sexy outfit' doesn't really exist in the public consciousness. Everyone always makes some joke about how sexy comics men would have giant codpieces, but I don't think those people are actually attracted to giant codpieces. If you ask 10 different people what a sexy man looks like you'll probably get 10 different answers.

    The idea of a 'sexy' male character is a lot more nebulous. When we see celebrities who get a lot of female attention and fans (say, a Tom Hiddleston or Benedict Cumberbatch), their attractiveness tends to rest more on their perceived personality than solely on their appearance or body type. This isn't because men are shallow, it's because as a society we've created different symbols for sexuality across the genders, and we interpret them in different ways. So even if lots of guys wear silly impractical things (like James Bond in a suit or whatever), it still won't get interpreted the same way as it would on a woman.

    If there were some combination of lines an artist could draw that the vast majority of straight women would interpret immediately as 'sexy guy', you'd probably see those lines drawn a lot. There are always artists willing to pander to an eager crowd. That sequence of lines doesn't exist right now, for a lot of really complicated reasons. It's ultimately a bit of a simplification to say that artists should draw something that we, as a society, have no concept for and haven't expressed any great interest in seeing.

    There's sexy male outfits. Something that's tight and shows off their physique is usually what's used.

    So like, spandex? Doesn't almost every male superhero wear that?

    Let's compare spandex worn by male and female super-heroes.

    superman-costume-456.jpg

    faf35-spider-woman_super.jpg?w=266&h=400

    See the difference?

    Well, the Superman one on the left is drawn looks like its from the 50s, with inking and stylistic standards matching that time, so there's not a lot of sexy detail to it. The blue dude on the left and the orange lady below are pretty similar, but both are held back from being sexy by weird proportions.

    Blue dude is probably a better design in general (more consistency and focus to him), but both he and orange lady's outfit are skintight and sexy. Physically, they're both about what you'd expect from someone exaggerating the male/female form. The pose is different, but I'm not really sure how you could effectively draw the dude in a 'sexy' pose like she has without it looking silly, while I can easily see how you'd draw the woman in a power pose.

    I think it's all about the pose more then anything. That's what makes one skin-tight outfit sexy and the other heroic.

  • Harry DresdenHarry Dresden Registered User regular
    Squidget0 wrote: »
    Well, the Superman one on the left is drawn looks like its from the 50s, with inking and stylistic standards matching that time, so there's not a lot of sexy detail to it. The blue dude on the left and the orange lady below are pretty similar, but both are held back from being sexy by weird proportions.

    Ignore regular Superman, it's Blue Superman I bought the picture up for. Those images were both covers by Big Two comic companies.
    Blue dude is probably a better design in general (more consistency and focus to him), but both he and orange lady's outfit are skintight and sexy. Physically, they're both about what you'd expect from someone exaggerating the male/female form. The pose is different, but I'm not really sure how you could effectively draw the dude in a 'sexy' pose like she has without it looking silly, while I can easily see how you'd draw the woman in a power pose.

    Blue Superman is handsome, the poses are where the difference lies. Superman looks confident, he can kick ass and take names. No one's going to fuck with that guy. He's what male readers want to be. Spider-Woman is drawn with her costume so skin-tight her belly button is showing and she's in a pose super models use to look sexy. She's not there to fight, she's there for male readers to want to have sex with. It's a character engulfed in the male gaze to lure male readers into buying the comic because she's hot. The reverse is a unicorn for mainstream super-hero comics.

  • PonyPony Registered User regular
    Squidget0 wrote: »
    Pony wrote: »
    Now, back to Magik. Let me toss on my Bane mask and ask you does she feel in charge? Look at those abs. Or more accurately, look at the lack of them. She's just got this sort of little line going on suggesting that sexy little ab canyon that a lot female superheroes got going on (see also: basically any picture of Supergirl in the last ten years) that real women kinda don't actually have unless they exclusively focus on weight loss and "toning" exercises that just burn body fat and don't actually build efficient, dense muscle worth a fuck.

    And that's the body she has. One that is sexy but not worth a fuck in a fight. Because she's a sex-thing. She's not meant to be a power fantasy, she's a sex object. You're not meant to want to be her, you're meant to want to fuck her. Whether you do or not is irrelevant, again, that's what's going on here.

    Before anyone even tries to claim that this is somehow okay because Magik is... well, magic and therefore doesn't need to have a rumble-ready power body, again I remind you that neither does fucking Cyclops. Cyclops actually has zero reason to be swole as he is, whereas Magik primarily fights with that giant as fuck sword of hers, which magical non-weight or whatever notwithstanding, would still suggest she'd look less like a runway model and more like someone with actual muscles right? Even if they have superpowers?

    And like you said, it would be one thing if a character's sexuality is a component of who that character is, which for Catwoman or say (again to use an X-Men example) Emma Frost, it absolutely is

    like I actually don't mind that Emma Frost dresses like she do, she Emma Frost, that how she do

    but Magik is a demon-fightin' sword-wielding bad-ass who traverses dimensions and shit. She doesn't seduce people or make sexiness a part of her interactions. In fact I'm trying to think of a romantic interest for Magik and I'm coming up empty!

    she gets sexualized anyway

    because comic books, is why

    I think you're overestimating how common the muscle fantasy is for women. I'd be much more likely to fantasize about being someone who looks like Magik than being a muscled body-builder or whatever. It's not like you have to choose between sexyness and power in a fantasy. I can imagine both having an awesome sexy build and being really agile or strong or whatever.

    I suspect that I am not alone in this. For example, night elves and other pretty races are much more popular among female players in WoW. I'm pretty sure that if you made an RPG and let people choose between playing a woman who looks like Magik and playing someone with a lady bodybuilder physique, most female players would be more likely to choose Magik. She's probably not a character I'd design given total creative freedom, but if I had to try to make her more appealing I don't think I'd start by adding more muscles.

    The line between a sexual fantasy and a power fantasy is weird, because being sexually powerful can also be a fantasy, so it's not like a character is only one or the other. I think the key word to focus on with a design is aspirational, and sexy can definitely be a part of that. One game that really illustrates the difference is early League of Legends character designs vs. more recent ones. Both designs might be a sexy-looking woman, but where Janna (older design) flirts with the player and makes jokes about phone sex, Shyvana (a more recent design) turns into a dragon and eats people. A lot of the recent LoL champions are totally rad, and they manage to be quite sexy in the process. I think it strikes a good balance.

    Christ, where to begin with this post...

    Alright, to start with, the fact that women internalize sexist body images being bulldozered upon them by entertainment media does not make those entertainment media images less sexist. Second, when women are given choices in exclusion to play sexy female characters or not play female characters at all, yes they will tend to go for the sexy.

    Third, you have done a pretty classic bit of bullshit false dichotomy with "female bodybuilder" versus "sexy woman", with which you are trying to conjure basically this image:
    Nikki_Fuller.jpg

    as if women are forced to choose one or the other for their fantastical representation in entertainment media and of course, the majority of women are going to choose being "sexy" over looking like Nikki Fuller there (after all, they are told their entire lives by a patriarchal cultural narrative that it is an important part of their worth as a woman)

    Except that choice you are presenting is hot garbage, dude. It's not between looking like a Warcraft Night Elf or Magik or Supergirl (who looks fucking awful in most of her art). There's actually a vast, vast array of how women's bodies look when they are strong, powerful, muscular, fit, and capable of kicking major ass. Go look at pictures of female MMA fighters, for example, to see what a woman's body looks like when she literally fights for a living.

    This isn't even a "realism" argument, either, this is you trying to trap someone with a bullshit choice, as if there's no other way out of this garbage except to give them superpowers while still making them aesthetically pleasing fuck-things for male eyes, else they become something completely unfeminine that would hold zero appeal to them. That's the binary you set up, and you're not alone in it and it's bullshit.

    It traps women, for example, into not going to the gym except to "tone". When I was a kickboxing instructor, I had a really, really hard time getting some of the newer female students to actually strength train properly and develop good muscle mass, because some of them were terrified of basically bulking the fuck out and turning into some kind of, and I'm gonna quote one of my former students here, "some jacked female bodybuilder freakshow" if they did anything more than calisthenics and cardio and sparring. The narrative they had internalized was that strength and beauty were mutually exclusive for a woman at a certain level and that to stay "fit" but also "beautiful" meant inevitably they had to stop at a certain point and say "this far, no further", lest they risk their breasts disappearing and developing massive man shoulders.

    And where they thought that point was? It was completely out of step with reality, putting aside how fucked up the entire notion is on its face.

    So forgive me for being completely hostile to this argument that superpowered waifs are somehow okay to media bomb women with, and don't at all harm them or make them weaker.

  • Harry DresdenHarry Dresden Registered User regular
    edited September 2014
    in+the+blood+gina+carano.jpg

    Gina Carano is an excellent example of a physically fit strong woman who is super fine. She's so sexy she's got an acting career in Hollywood. A good example between the extremes of what strong women body types are.

    Harry Dresden on
  • ElJeffeElJeffe Moderator, ClubPA mod
    Geth, kick @_J_‌ from the thread for failing to pass the Turing test.

    I submitted an entry to Lego Ideas, and if 10,000 people support me, it'll be turned into an actual Lego set!If you'd like to see and support my submission, follow this link.
  • GethGeth Legion Perseus VeilRegistered User, Moderator, Penny Arcade Staff, Vanilla Staff vanilla
    Affirmative ElJeffe. @_J_ banned from this thread for failing to pass the Turing test.

  • PaladinPaladin Registered User regular
    It is this variety that makes it hard for women to predict whether or not they will preserve whatever secondary sex characteristics appeal to their personal identity. Considering that for some this can be partially true, the solution isn't easy. Unfortunately for women, these characteristics are taken as sexual, while beards get no joy.

    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.
  • Squidget0Squidget0 Registered User regular
    Pony wrote: »
    Squidget0 wrote: »
    Pony wrote: »
    Now, back to Magik. Let me toss on my Bane mask and ask you does she feel in charge? Look at those abs. Or more accurately, look at the lack of them. She's just got this sort of little line going on suggesting that sexy little ab canyon that a lot female superheroes got going on (see also: basically any picture of Supergirl in the last ten years) that real women kinda don't actually have unless they exclusively focus on weight loss and "toning" exercises that just burn body fat and don't actually build efficient, dense muscle worth a fuck.

    And that's the body she has. One that is sexy but not worth a fuck in a fight. Because she's a sex-thing. She's not meant to be a power fantasy, she's a sex object. You're not meant to want to be her, you're meant to want to fuck her. Whether you do or not is irrelevant, again, that's what's going on here.

    Before anyone even tries to claim that this is somehow okay because Magik is... well, magic and therefore doesn't need to have a rumble-ready power body, again I remind you that neither does fucking Cyclops. Cyclops actually has zero reason to be swole as he is, whereas Magik primarily fights with that giant as fuck sword of hers, which magical non-weight or whatever notwithstanding, would still suggest she'd look less like a runway model and more like someone with actual muscles right? Even if they have superpowers?

    And like you said, it would be one thing if a character's sexuality is a component of who that character is, which for Catwoman or say (again to use an X-Men example) Emma Frost, it absolutely is

    like I actually don't mind that Emma Frost dresses like she do, she Emma Frost, that how she do

    but Magik is a demon-fightin' sword-wielding bad-ass who traverses dimensions and shit. She doesn't seduce people or make sexiness a part of her interactions. In fact I'm trying to think of a romantic interest for Magik and I'm coming up empty!

    she gets sexualized anyway

    because comic books, is why

    I think you're overestimating how common the muscle fantasy is for women. I'd be much more likely to fantasize about being someone who looks like Magik than being a muscled body-builder or whatever. It's not like you have to choose between sexyness and power in a fantasy. I can imagine both having an awesome sexy build and being really agile or strong or whatever.

    I suspect that I am not alone in this. For example, night elves and other pretty races are much more popular among female players in WoW. I'm pretty sure that if you made an RPG and let people choose between playing a woman who looks like Magik and playing someone with a lady bodybuilder physique, most female players would be more likely to choose Magik. She's probably not a character I'd design given total creative freedom, but if I had to try to make her more appealing I don't think I'd start by adding more muscles.

    The line between a sexual fantasy and a power fantasy is weird, because being sexually powerful can also be a fantasy, so it's not like a character is only one or the other. I think the key word to focus on with a design is aspirational, and sexy can definitely be a part of that. One game that really illustrates the difference is early League of Legends character designs vs. more recent ones. Both designs might be a sexy-looking woman, but where Janna (older design) flirts with the player and makes jokes about phone sex, Shyvana (a more recent design) turns into a dragon and eats people. A lot of the recent LoL champions are totally rad, and they manage to be quite sexy in the process. I think it strikes a good balance.

    Christ, where to begin with this post...

    Alright, to start with, the fact that women internalize sexist body images being bulldozered upon them by entertainment media does not make those entertainment media images less sexist. Second, when women are given choices in exclusion to play sexy female characters or not play female characters at all, yes they will tend to go for the sexy.

    Third, you have done a pretty classic bit of bullshit false dichotomy with "female bodybuilder" versus "sexy woman", with which you are trying to conjure basically this image:

    as if women are forced to choose one or the other for their fantastical representation in entertainment media and of course, the majority of women are going to choose being "sexy" over looking like Nikki Fuller there (after all, they are told their entire lives by a patriarchal cultural narrative that it is an important part of their worth as a woman)

    Except that choice you are presenting is hot garbage, dude. It's not between looking like a Warcraft Night Elf or Magik or Supergirl (who looks fucking awful in most of her art). There's actually a vast, vast array of how women's bodies look when they are strong, powerful, muscular, fit, and capable of kicking major ass. Go look at pictures of female MMA fighters, for example, to see what a woman's body looks like when she literally fights for a living.

    This isn't even a "realism" argument, either, this is you trying to trap someone with a bullshit choice, as if there's no other way out of this garbage except to give them superpowers while still making them aesthetically pleasing fuck-things for male eyes, else they become something completely unfeminine that would hold zero appeal to them. That's the binary you set up, and you're not alone in it and it's bullshit.

    It traps women, for example, into not going to the gym except to "tone". When I was a kickboxing instructor, I had a really, really hard time getting some of the newer female students to actually strength train properly and develop good muscle mass, because some of them were terrified of basically bulking the fuck out and turning into some kind of, and I'm gonna quote one of my former students here, "some jacked female bodybuilder freakshow" if they did anything more than calisthenics and cardio and sparring. The narrative they had internalized was that strength and beauty were mutually exclusive for a woman at a certain level and that to stay "fit" but also "beautiful" meant inevitably they had to stop at a certain point and say "this far, no further", lest they risk their breasts disappearing and developing massive man shoulders.

    And where they thought that point was? It was completely out of step with reality, putting aside how fucked up the entire notion is on its face.

    So forgive me for being completely hostile to this argument that superpowered waifs are somehow okay to media bomb women with, and don't at all harm them or make them weaker.

    Weaker in what sense? I don't feel the least bit weaker in real life for not being muscled or physically strong. I think muscles are primarily an appearance thing for most people, or a product of their hobbies, so I don't really see why having 'bulky' is the standard is better than 'slim.' It's not like the average person is getting into fist fights on a daily basis. I'd still probably fantasize about being a night elf over being a lady MMA fighter, because being all muscled and punching people doesn't hold that much appeal to me.

    I guess I can see how it would be a problem if you're trying to teach women martial arts, but I don't think that's a goal for most entertainment media.

  • PonyPony Registered User regular
    Squidget0 wrote: »
    Pony wrote: »
    Squidget0 wrote: »
    Pony wrote: »
    Now, back to Magik. Let me toss on my Bane mask and ask you does she feel in charge? Look at those abs. Or more accurately, look at the lack of them. She's just got this sort of little line going on suggesting that sexy little ab canyon that a lot female superheroes got going on (see also: basically any picture of Supergirl in the last ten years) that real women kinda don't actually have unless they exclusively focus on weight loss and "toning" exercises that just burn body fat and don't actually build efficient, dense muscle worth a fuck.

    And that's the body she has. One that is sexy but not worth a fuck in a fight. Because she's a sex-thing. She's not meant to be a power fantasy, she's a sex object. You're not meant to want to be her, you're meant to want to fuck her. Whether you do or not is irrelevant, again, that's what's going on here.

    Before anyone even tries to claim that this is somehow okay because Magik is... well, magic and therefore doesn't need to have a rumble-ready power body, again I remind you that neither does fucking Cyclops. Cyclops actually has zero reason to be swole as he is, whereas Magik primarily fights with that giant as fuck sword of hers, which magical non-weight or whatever notwithstanding, would still suggest she'd look less like a runway model and more like someone with actual muscles right? Even if they have superpowers?

    And like you said, it would be one thing if a character's sexuality is a component of who that character is, which for Catwoman or say (again to use an X-Men example) Emma Frost, it absolutely is

    like I actually don't mind that Emma Frost dresses like she do, she Emma Frost, that how she do

    but Magik is a demon-fightin' sword-wielding bad-ass who traverses dimensions and shit. She doesn't seduce people or make sexiness a part of her interactions. In fact I'm trying to think of a romantic interest for Magik and I'm coming up empty!

    she gets sexualized anyway

    because comic books, is why

    I think you're overestimating how common the muscle fantasy is for women. I'd be much more likely to fantasize about being someone who looks like Magik than being a muscled body-builder or whatever. It's not like you have to choose between sexyness and power in a fantasy. I can imagine both having an awesome sexy build and being really agile or strong or whatever.

    I suspect that I am not alone in this. For example, night elves and other pretty races are much more popular among female players in WoW. I'm pretty sure that if you made an RPG and let people choose between playing a woman who looks like Magik and playing someone with a lady bodybuilder physique, most female players would be more likely to choose Magik. She's probably not a character I'd design given total creative freedom, but if I had to try to make her more appealing I don't think I'd start by adding more muscles.

    The line between a sexual fantasy and a power fantasy is weird, because being sexually powerful can also be a fantasy, so it's not like a character is only one or the other. I think the key word to focus on with a design is aspirational, and sexy can definitely be a part of that. One game that really illustrates the difference is early League of Legends character designs vs. more recent ones. Both designs might be a sexy-looking woman, but where Janna (older design) flirts with the player and makes jokes about phone sex, Shyvana (a more recent design) turns into a dragon and eats people. A lot of the recent LoL champions are totally rad, and they manage to be quite sexy in the process. I think it strikes a good balance.

    Christ, where to begin with this post...

    Alright, to start with, the fact that women internalize sexist body images being bulldozered upon them by entertainment media does not make those entertainment media images less sexist. Second, when women are given choices in exclusion to play sexy female characters or not play female characters at all, yes they will tend to go for the sexy.

    Third, you have done a pretty classic bit of bullshit false dichotomy with "female bodybuilder" versus "sexy woman", with which you are trying to conjure basically this image:

    as if women are forced to choose one or the other for their fantastical representation in entertainment media and of course, the majority of women are going to choose being "sexy" over looking like Nikki Fuller there (after all, they are told their entire lives by a patriarchal cultural narrative that it is an important part of their worth as a woman)

    Except that choice you are presenting is hot garbage, dude. It's not between looking like a Warcraft Night Elf or Magik or Supergirl (who looks fucking awful in most of her art). There's actually a vast, vast array of how women's bodies look when they are strong, powerful, muscular, fit, and capable of kicking major ass. Go look at pictures of female MMA fighters, for example, to see what a woman's body looks like when she literally fights for a living.

    This isn't even a "realism" argument, either, this is you trying to trap someone with a bullshit choice, as if there's no other way out of this garbage except to give them superpowers while still making them aesthetically pleasing fuck-things for male eyes, else they become something completely unfeminine that would hold zero appeal to them. That's the binary you set up, and you're not alone in it and it's bullshit.

    It traps women, for example, into not going to the gym except to "tone". When I was a kickboxing instructor, I had a really, really hard time getting some of the newer female students to actually strength train properly and develop good muscle mass, because some of them were terrified of basically bulking the fuck out and turning into some kind of, and I'm gonna quote one of my former students here, "some jacked female bodybuilder freakshow" if they did anything more than calisthenics and cardio and sparring. The narrative they had internalized was that strength and beauty were mutually exclusive for a woman at a certain level and that to stay "fit" but also "beautiful" meant inevitably they had to stop at a certain point and say "this far, no further", lest they risk their breasts disappearing and developing massive man shoulders.

    And where they thought that point was? It was completely out of step with reality, putting aside how fucked up the entire notion is on its face.

    So forgive me for being completely hostile to this argument that superpowered waifs are somehow okay to media bomb women with, and don't at all harm them or make them weaker.

    Weaker in what sense? I don't feel the least bit weaker in real life for not being muscled or physically strong. I think muscles are primarily an appearance thing for most people, or a product of their hobbies, so I don't really see why having 'bulky' is the standard is better than 'slim.' It's not like the average person is getting into fist fights on a daily basis. I'd still probably fantasize about being a night elf over being a lady MMA fighter, because being all muscled and punching people doesn't hold that much appeal to me.

    I guess I can see how it would be a problem if you're trying to teach women martial arts, but I don't think that's a goal for most entertainment media.

    "Ladies and gentlemen, that screeching sound you're hearing is the moving of goalposts"

  • Harry DresdenHarry Dresden Registered User regular
    edited September 2014
    Squidget0 wrote: »
    Pony wrote: »
    Squidget0 wrote: »
    Pony wrote: »
    Now, back to Magik. Let me toss on my Bane mask and ask you does she feel in charge? Look at those abs. Or more accurately, look at the lack of them. She's just got this sort of little line going on suggesting that sexy little ab canyon that a lot female superheroes got going on (see also: basically any picture of Supergirl in the last ten years) that real women kinda don't actually have unless they exclusively focus on weight loss and "toning" exercises that just burn body fat and don't actually build efficient, dense muscle worth a fuck.

    And that's the body she has. One that is sexy but not worth a fuck in a fight. Because she's a sex-thing. She's not meant to be a power fantasy, she's a sex object. You're not meant to want to be her, you're meant to want to fuck her. Whether you do or not is irrelevant, again, that's what's going on here.

    Before anyone even tries to claim that this is somehow okay because Magik is... well, magic and therefore doesn't need to have a rumble-ready power body, again I remind you that neither does fucking Cyclops. Cyclops actually has zero reason to be swole as he is, whereas Magik primarily fights with that giant as fuck sword of hers, which magical non-weight or whatever notwithstanding, would still suggest she'd look less like a runway model and more like someone with actual muscles right? Even if they have superpowers?

    And like you said, it would be one thing if a character's sexuality is a component of who that character is, which for Catwoman or say (again to use an X-Men example) Emma Frost, it absolutely is

    like I actually don't mind that Emma Frost dresses like she do, she Emma Frost, that how she do

    but Magik is a demon-fightin' sword-wielding bad-ass who traverses dimensions and shit. She doesn't seduce people or make sexiness a part of her interactions. In fact I'm trying to think of a romantic interest for Magik and I'm coming up empty!

    she gets sexualized anyway

    because comic books, is why

    I think you're overestimating how common the muscle fantasy is for women. I'd be much more likely to fantasize about being someone who looks like Magik than being a muscled body-builder or whatever. It's not like you have to choose between sexyness and power in a fantasy. I can imagine both having an awesome sexy build and being really agile or strong or whatever.

    I suspect that I am not alone in this. For example, night elves and other pretty races are much more popular among female players in WoW. I'm pretty sure that if you made an RPG and let people choose between playing a woman who looks like Magik and playing someone with a lady bodybuilder physique, most female players would be more likely to choose Magik. She's probably not a character I'd design given total creative freedom, but if I had to try to make her more appealing I don't think I'd start by adding more muscles.

    The line between a sexual fantasy and a power fantasy is weird, because being sexually powerful can also be a fantasy, so it's not like a character is only one or the other. I think the key word to focus on with a design is aspirational, and sexy can definitely be a part of that. One game that really illustrates the difference is early League of Legends character designs vs. more recent ones. Both designs might be a sexy-looking woman, but where Janna (older design) flirts with the player and makes jokes about phone sex, Shyvana (a more recent design) turns into a dragon and eats people. A lot of the recent LoL champions are totally rad, and they manage to be quite sexy in the process. I think it strikes a good balance.

    Christ, where to begin with this post...

    Alright, to start with, the fact that women internalize sexist body images being bulldozered upon them by entertainment media does not make those entertainment media images less sexist. Second, when women are given choices in exclusion to play sexy female characters or not play female characters at all, yes they will tend to go for the sexy.

    Third, you have done a pretty classic bit of bullshit false dichotomy with "female bodybuilder" versus "sexy woman", with which you are trying to conjure basically this image:

    as if women are forced to choose one or the other for their fantastical representation in entertainment media and of course, the majority of women are going to choose being "sexy" over looking like Nikki Fuller there (after all, they are told their entire lives by a patriarchal cultural narrative that it is an important part of their worth as a woman)

    Except that choice you are presenting is hot garbage, dude. It's not between looking like a Warcraft Night Elf or Magik or Supergirl (who looks fucking awful in most of her art). There's actually a vast, vast array of how women's bodies look when they are strong, powerful, muscular, fit, and capable of kicking major ass. Go look at pictures of female MMA fighters, for example, to see what a woman's body looks like when she literally fights for a living.

    This isn't even a "realism" argument, either, this is you trying to trap someone with a bullshit choice, as if there's no other way out of this garbage except to give them superpowers while still making them aesthetically pleasing fuck-things for male eyes, else they become something completely unfeminine that would hold zero appeal to them. That's the binary you set up, and you're not alone in it and it's bullshit.

    It traps women, for example, into not going to the gym except to "tone". When I was a kickboxing instructor, I had a really, really hard time getting some of the newer female students to actually strength train properly and develop good muscle mass, because some of them were terrified of basically bulking the fuck out and turning into some kind of, and I'm gonna quote one of my former students here, "some jacked female bodybuilder freakshow" if they did anything more than calisthenics and cardio and sparring. The narrative they had internalized was that strength and beauty were mutually exclusive for a woman at a certain level and that to stay "fit" but also "beautiful" meant inevitably they had to stop at a certain point and say "this far, no further", lest they risk their breasts disappearing and developing massive man shoulders.

    And where they thought that point was? It was completely out of step with reality, putting aside how fucked up the entire notion is on its face.

    So forgive me for being completely hostile to this argument that superpowered waifs are somehow okay to media bomb women with, and don't at all harm them or make them weaker.

    Weaker in what sense? I don't feel the least bit weaker in real life for not being muscled or physically strong. I think muscles are primarily an appearance thing for most people, or a product of their hobbies, so I don't really see why having 'bulky' is the standard is better than 'slim.' It's not like the average person is getting into fist fights on a daily basis. I'd still probably fantasize about being a night elf over being a lady MMA fighter, because being all muscled and punching people doesn't hold that much appeal to me.

    I guess I can see how it would be a problem if you're trying to teach women martial arts, but I don't think that's a goal for most entertainment media.

    What Pony was talking about was that society has ingrained in women that they should prize their beauty above everything else. This closes down their options for choices to make, down to one: look sexy. When they should be able to choose that from themselves without valuing society's judgement on their bodies, they are also ignorant about not knowing they don't have to go to extremes to be sexy and have muscles, re: Gina Carano. Many men in the world aren't going to turn down Carano for a date.

    Harry Dresden on
  • CambiataCambiata Commander Shepard The likes of which even GAWD has never seenRegistered User regular
    edited September 2014
    I always like to refer to this photo set depicting (potentially NSFW for people in swimsuits) body shapes of athletes for people wondering what else we could POSSIBLY have besides ultra ripped and supermodel. There's a lot of diversity there! And it's actually interesting to see the differences the human body can have!

    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
  • Apothe0sisApothe0sis Have you ever questioned the nature of your reality? Registered User regular
    _J_ wrote: »
    Quid wrote: »
    Alinius133 wrote: »
    Astaereth wrote: »
    There's a difference between "I didn't like this game because the graphics were bad" and "This game's bad graphics are indicative of an industry-wide cancer. We need more games with good graphics and fewer games with bad graphics. Artists who make games with bad graphics should be ashamed of themselves and we should all endeavor only to support games with good graphics."

    I see a little projection in your post and think you might want to look at the two hypothetical criticisms you've listed and ask yourself, honestly, if you represented both sides accurately.

    Regardless of "graphics are bad vs. I WILL BURN DOWN YOUR HOUSE," let's set that aside for a moment, I don't care that they are different. I want to know why one is OK to discuss critically and one isn't. Graphics are fair game. Story is fair game. Load times are fair game. Weapon realism is fair game. Representation of women is not. Why?

    Because sexism/racism/etc. has baggage that those other categories do not.

    Saying "You wrote a bad story" implies you did an inferior job.
    Saying "You wrote a sexist story" implies that you maligned half of the human race.

    So what do you suggest be done when someone writes a sexist story?

    The same thing we do when someone writes a violent story.

    Put it in the correct section of the bookstore.
    I don't know if the equivalence quite works in this regard - in the sense that "violent" isn't the same kind of category as "sexist",

    In that something can be violent without promoting violence - like a crime fiction story wherein very violent things happen but the perpetrators are righteously punished. The "violent" descriptor denotes what the content portrays.

    Whereas to describe a story as "sexist" doesn't denote the same thing - to describe something as sexist relates to the the contents' disposition toward its content.

    A book that portrays violence but has an anti-violence message would be a violent book. Whereas it would be odd to describe a book that portrays sexism but has an anti-sexism message as a sexist book.

    I would suggest that if we then add into the bin of "sexist books" books that contain tropes that are arguendo sexist then this equivalence becomes even more unstable.

    I would also note that this criticism applies only to the bookstore part of this particular argument.

  • PonyPony Registered User regular
    Squidget0 wrote: »
    Pony wrote: »
    Squidget0 wrote: »
    Pony wrote: »
    Now, back to Magik. Let me toss on my Bane mask and ask you does she feel in charge? Look at those abs. Or more accurately, look at the lack of them. She's just got this sort of little line going on suggesting that sexy little ab canyon that a lot female superheroes got going on (see also: basically any picture of Supergirl in the last ten years) that real women kinda don't actually have unless they exclusively focus on weight loss and "toning" exercises that just burn body fat and don't actually build efficient, dense muscle worth a fuck.

    And that's the body she has. One that is sexy but not worth a fuck in a fight. Because she's a sex-thing. She's not meant to be a power fantasy, she's a sex object. You're not meant to want to be her, you're meant to want to fuck her. Whether you do or not is irrelevant, again, that's what's going on here.

    Before anyone even tries to claim that this is somehow okay because Magik is... well, magic and therefore doesn't need to have a rumble-ready power body, again I remind you that neither does fucking Cyclops. Cyclops actually has zero reason to be swole as he is, whereas Magik primarily fights with that giant as fuck sword of hers, which magical non-weight or whatever notwithstanding, would still suggest she'd look less like a runway model and more like someone with actual muscles right? Even if they have superpowers?

    And like you said, it would be one thing if a character's sexuality is a component of who that character is, which for Catwoman or say (again to use an X-Men example) Emma Frost, it absolutely is

    like I actually don't mind that Emma Frost dresses like she do, she Emma Frost, that how she do

    but Magik is a demon-fightin' sword-wielding bad-ass who traverses dimensions and shit. She doesn't seduce people or make sexiness a part of her interactions. In fact I'm trying to think of a romantic interest for Magik and I'm coming up empty!

    she gets sexualized anyway

    because comic books, is why

    I think you're overestimating how common the muscle fantasy is for women. I'd be much more likely to fantasize about being someone who looks like Magik than being a muscled body-builder or whatever. It's not like you have to choose between sexyness and power in a fantasy. I can imagine both having an awesome sexy build and being really agile or strong or whatever.

    I suspect that I am not alone in this. For example, night elves and other pretty races are much more popular among female players in WoW. I'm pretty sure that if you made an RPG and let people choose between playing a woman who looks like Magik and playing someone with a lady bodybuilder physique, most female players would be more likely to choose Magik. She's probably not a character I'd design given total creative freedom, but if I had to try to make her more appealing I don't think I'd start by adding more muscles.

    The line between a sexual fantasy and a power fantasy is weird, because being sexually powerful can also be a fantasy, so it's not like a character is only one or the other. I think the key word to focus on with a design is aspirational, and sexy can definitely be a part of that. One game that really illustrates the difference is early League of Legends character designs vs. more recent ones. Both designs might be a sexy-looking woman, but where Janna (older design) flirts with the player and makes jokes about phone sex, Shyvana (a more recent design) turns into a dragon and eats people. A lot of the recent LoL champions are totally rad, and they manage to be quite sexy in the process. I think it strikes a good balance.

    Christ, where to begin with this post...

    Alright, to start with, the fact that women internalize sexist body images being bulldozered upon them by entertainment media does not make those entertainment media images less sexist. Second, when women are given choices in exclusion to play sexy female characters or not play female characters at all, yes they will tend to go for the sexy.

    Third, you have done a pretty classic bit of bullshit false dichotomy with "female bodybuilder" versus "sexy woman", with which you are trying to conjure basically this image:

    as if women are forced to choose one or the other for their fantastical representation in entertainment media and of course, the majority of women are going to choose being "sexy" over looking like Nikki Fuller there (after all, they are told their entire lives by a patriarchal cultural narrative that it is an important part of their worth as a woman)

    Except that choice you are presenting is hot garbage, dude. It's not between looking like a Warcraft Night Elf or Magik or Supergirl (who looks fucking awful in most of her art). There's actually a vast, vast array of how women's bodies look when they are strong, powerful, muscular, fit, and capable of kicking major ass. Go look at pictures of female MMA fighters, for example, to see what a woman's body looks like when she literally fights for a living.

    This isn't even a "realism" argument, either, this is you trying to trap someone with a bullshit choice, as if there's no other way out of this garbage except to give them superpowers while still making them aesthetically pleasing fuck-things for male eyes, else they become something completely unfeminine that would hold zero appeal to them. That's the binary you set up, and you're not alone in it and it's bullshit.

    It traps women, for example, into not going to the gym except to "tone". When I was a kickboxing instructor, I had a really, really hard time getting some of the newer female students to actually strength train properly and develop good muscle mass, because some of them were terrified of basically bulking the fuck out and turning into some kind of, and I'm gonna quote one of my former students here, "some jacked female bodybuilder freakshow" if they did anything more than calisthenics and cardio and sparring. The narrative they had internalized was that strength and beauty were mutually exclusive for a woman at a certain level and that to stay "fit" but also "beautiful" meant inevitably they had to stop at a certain point and say "this far, no further", lest they risk their breasts disappearing and developing massive man shoulders.

    And where they thought that point was? It was completely out of step with reality, putting aside how fucked up the entire notion is on its face.

    So forgive me for being completely hostile to this argument that superpowered waifs are somehow okay to media bomb women with, and don't at all harm them or make them weaker.

    Weaker in what sense? I don't feel the least bit weaker in real life for not being muscled or physically strong. I think muscles are primarily an appearance thing for most people, or a product of their hobbies, so I don't really see why having 'bulky' is the standard is better than 'slim.' It's not like the average person is getting into fist fights on a daily basis. I'd still probably fantasize about being a night elf over being a lady MMA fighter, because being all muscled and punching people doesn't hold that much appeal to me.

    I guess I can see how it would be a problem if you're trying to teach women martial arts, but I don't think that's a goal for most entertainment media.

    What Pony was talking about was that society has ingrained in women that they should prize their beauty above everything else. This closes down their options for choices to make, down to one: look sexy. When they should be able to choose that from themselves without valuing society's judgement on their bodies, they are also ignorant about not knowing they don't have to go to extremes to be sexy and have muscles, re: Gina Carano. Many men in the world aren't going to turn down Carano for a date.

    Exactly. I'm not knocking women for wanting to be sexually attractive. That's perfectly fine. It shouldn't form the whole of your self-identity or your sense of self-worth, but if it's something you want for yourself that's totally healthy and okay. And if you're unwilling to completely sacrifice that for the sake of something else, that's okay too.

    Except, it's not a sacrifice. It's not a binary. It just gets presented to them, over and over and over again, as one, with viewpoints like Squidget's, even if that wasn't what Squidget intended or understood. They eventually internalize it and think it is one and think there's no way out of that.

    And entertainment media is a part of that, because even their powerful heroes are presented as sexy or waifish and generally both. Whether it's Night Elves or Buffy or River Tam or Supergirl or whatever, there's a fucking avalanche of this body image in media that tells women "You can be powerful... if you have superpowers n' shit, and because you got superpowers you don't really gotta look like anything except skinny and hot, ladies"

    There are characters to the contrary, of course. To contrast with Supergirl, there's Power Girl, who generally through-out her history is drawn very much like she got the power, gurl. But then she also tends to have a really unfortunate cleavage window on her costume, so... hrm... okay maybe she's not the best contrast... uh...

    Well, I mean they do exist. They're just not especially common, although that's improving.

    And I think that improvement, in no small part, has to do with people speaking out against this kind of bullshit.

  • Squidget0Squidget0 Registered User regular
    Squidget0 wrote: »
    Pony wrote: »
    Squidget0 wrote: »
    Pony wrote: »
    Now, back to Magik. Let me toss on my Bane mask and ask you does she feel in charge? Look at those abs. Or more accurately, look at the lack of them. She's just got this sort of little line going on suggesting that sexy little ab canyon that a lot female superheroes got going on (see also: basically any picture of Supergirl in the last ten years) that real women kinda don't actually have unless they exclusively focus on weight loss and "toning" exercises that just burn body fat and don't actually build efficient, dense muscle worth a fuck.

    And that's the body she has. One that is sexy but not worth a fuck in a fight. Because she's a sex-thing. She's not meant to be a power fantasy, she's a sex object. You're not meant to want to be her, you're meant to want to fuck her. Whether you do or not is irrelevant, again, that's what's going on here.

    Before anyone even tries to claim that this is somehow okay because Magik is... well, magic and therefore doesn't need to have a rumble-ready power body, again I remind you that neither does fucking Cyclops. Cyclops actually has zero reason to be swole as he is, whereas Magik primarily fights with that giant as fuck sword of hers, which magical non-weight or whatever notwithstanding, would still suggest she'd look less like a runway model and more like someone with actual muscles right? Even if they have superpowers?

    And like you said, it would be one thing if a character's sexuality is a component of who that character is, which for Catwoman or say (again to use an X-Men example) Emma Frost, it absolutely is

    like I actually don't mind that Emma Frost dresses like she do, she Emma Frost, that how she do

    but Magik is a demon-fightin' sword-wielding bad-ass who traverses dimensions and shit. She doesn't seduce people or make sexiness a part of her interactions. In fact I'm trying to think of a romantic interest for Magik and I'm coming up empty!

    she gets sexualized anyway

    because comic books, is why

    I think you're overestimating how common the muscle fantasy is for women. I'd be much more likely to fantasize about being someone who looks like Magik than being a muscled body-builder or whatever. It's not like you have to choose between sexyness and power in a fantasy. I can imagine both having an awesome sexy build and being really agile or strong or whatever.

    I suspect that I am not alone in this. For example, night elves and other pretty races are much more popular among female players in WoW. I'm pretty sure that if you made an RPG and let people choose between playing a woman who looks like Magik and playing someone with a lady bodybuilder physique, most female players would be more likely to choose Magik. She's probably not a character I'd design given total creative freedom, but if I had to try to make her more appealing I don't think I'd start by adding more muscles.

    The line between a sexual fantasy and a power fantasy is weird, because being sexually powerful can also be a fantasy, so it's not like a character is only one or the other. I think the key word to focus on with a design is aspirational, and sexy can definitely be a part of that. One game that really illustrates the difference is early League of Legends character designs vs. more recent ones. Both designs might be a sexy-looking woman, but where Janna (older design) flirts with the player and makes jokes about phone sex, Shyvana (a more recent design) turns into a dragon and eats people. A lot of the recent LoL champions are totally rad, and they manage to be quite sexy in the process. I think it strikes a good balance.

    Christ, where to begin with this post...

    Alright, to start with, the fact that women internalize sexist body images being bulldozered upon them by entertainment media does not make those entertainment media images less sexist. Second, when women are given choices in exclusion to play sexy female characters or not play female characters at all, yes they will tend to go for the sexy.

    Third, you have done a pretty classic bit of bullshit false dichotomy with "female bodybuilder" versus "sexy woman", with which you are trying to conjure basically this image:

    as if women are forced to choose one or the other for their fantastical representation in entertainment media and of course, the majority of women are going to choose being "sexy" over looking like Nikki Fuller there (after all, they are told their entire lives by a patriarchal cultural narrative that it is an important part of their worth as a woman)

    Except that choice you are presenting is hot garbage, dude. It's not between looking like a Warcraft Night Elf or Magik or Supergirl (who looks fucking awful in most of her art). There's actually a vast, vast array of how women's bodies look when they are strong, powerful, muscular, fit, and capable of kicking major ass. Go look at pictures of female MMA fighters, for example, to see what a woman's body looks like when she literally fights for a living.

    This isn't even a "realism" argument, either, this is you trying to trap someone with a bullshit choice, as if there's no other way out of this garbage except to give them superpowers while still making them aesthetically pleasing fuck-things for male eyes, else they become something completely unfeminine that would hold zero appeal to them. That's the binary you set up, and you're not alone in it and it's bullshit.

    It traps women, for example, into not going to the gym except to "tone". When I was a kickboxing instructor, I had a really, really hard time getting some of the newer female students to actually strength train properly and develop good muscle mass, because some of them were terrified of basically bulking the fuck out and turning into some kind of, and I'm gonna quote one of my former students here, "some jacked female bodybuilder freakshow" if they did anything more than calisthenics and cardio and sparring. The narrative they had internalized was that strength and beauty were mutually exclusive for a woman at a certain level and that to stay "fit" but also "beautiful" meant inevitably they had to stop at a certain point and say "this far, no further", lest they risk their breasts disappearing and developing massive man shoulders.

    And where they thought that point was? It was completely out of step with reality, putting aside how fucked up the entire notion is on its face.

    So forgive me for being completely hostile to this argument that superpowered waifs are somehow okay to media bomb women with, and don't at all harm them or make them weaker.

    Weaker in what sense? I don't feel the least bit weaker in real life for not being muscled or physically strong. I think muscles are primarily an appearance thing for most people, or a product of their hobbies, so I don't really see why having 'bulky' is the standard is better than 'slim.' It's not like the average person is getting into fist fights on a daily basis. I'd still probably fantasize about being a night elf over being a lady MMA fighter, because being all muscled and punching people doesn't hold that much appeal to me.

    I guess I can see how it would be a problem if you're trying to teach women martial arts, but I don't think that's a goal for most entertainment media.

    What Pony was talking about was that society has ingrained in women that they should prize their beauty above everything else. This closes down their options for choices to make, down to one: look sexy. When they should be able to choose that from themselves without valuing society's judgement on their bodies, they are also ignorant about not knowing they don't have to go to extremes to be sexy and have muscles, re: Gina Carano. Many men in the world aren't going to turn down Carano for a date.

    Eh, I see what you're saying. Both genders get hit pretty hard with the "be attractive and sexy or you are worthless' message, but I don't really know any women who aren't professional models who would say that their appearance is their primary goal. It's generally seen as an an extraneous thing, like I want to be good at doing 'X' while also being sexy and hot. So if 'be sexy above all else' was the messaging, it didn't work.

    It certainly does affect priorities and choices though. Like, if I found out that a hobby I really enjoyed was making me fat, I'd probably stop doing it and find something else to do with the time. So my appearance is more important to me than ______, but I wouldn't say it's my primary goal - again, it's an extra.

    As for whether people should judge themselves based on society's standards, or love themselves for who they are...I guess that's a choice that every individual has to make. The same as an unemployed dude in his parent's basement has to choose between being 'himself' and playing MMOs all day, or trying to live up to society's unfair and difficult expectations. Everyone has to choose what expectations they want to live up to, and when.

    Anyway, my original point was that I don't really evaluate a lady's abs when I'm deciding whether or not she can be my fantasy. If I fantasize about being someone strong, that strength would only be reflected in my imaginary build if I thought it looked good. Based on the characters I've seen other people create I think that's a pretty common position to take.

  • IncenjucarIncenjucar VChatter Seattle, WARegistered User regular
    The choices a person makes are not made in a vacuum.

  • CambiataCambiata Commander Shepard The likes of which even GAWD has never seenRegistered User regular
    Squidget, why do you think that every time - EVERY TIME - there is a lady politician in the news, there is commentary about the way she looks? There's plenty of old shriveled dudes in politics and no one ever discusses the way they look. Why do you think that is?

    Or what about TV shows like the truly great Breaking Bad... why does average looking Walter White have a sexpot wife like Skylar? Why does fat, sexist schlub Hank Schrader have a wife as hot as Marie Schrader? Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying these women are supermodels... but compared to the overweight, completely average dudes they are married to, why are they so comparatively bangin'? And these are not an isolated case for TV wives/significant others.

    Why do you continually refuse to see the message that is sent in media that a woman is not a woman unless she's also pretty by society's standards?

    "If you divide the whole world into just enemies and friends, you'll end up destroying everything" --Nausicaa of the Valley of Wind
  • Ravenhpltc24Ravenhpltc24 So Raven Registered User regular
    I have to side with Pony on this one. I've met too many girls who refuse to do push-ups because they think muscles will explode forth should they lift anything heavier than a grande latte. I've gotten too many sideways glances from MEN when I use the rowing machine or choose to focus on my arms and shoulders at the gym. Basically, what I'm hearing from these experiences is 'exercising to build muscle is wrong.' Women exercise to be skinny, or they don't eat. Same end goal, really. It wasn't until a few years ago when I stopped into my mom's gym that I met her trainer. She worked out five times more than me and she looked fucking awesome. She worked out HARD. That's when it hit me that it was ok to strive to be strong.

    On another note, I grew up watching a lot of TV shows and movies. I also grew up thinking I'd never have a boyfriend because I was fat.

    That's fucked up.

    (V) ( ;,,; ) (V)
  • Apothe0sisApothe0sis Have you ever questioned the nature of your reality? Registered User regular
    shryke wrote: »
    Apothe0sis wrote: »
    shryke wrote: »
    Why do these kind of discussions always end up in the same place, which people apparently unable to understand that criticism is not censorship?

    It really comes off feeling like some people can't even accept criticism of things they like.

    This is about 7 pages late, but I would suggest that it's due to the vague and somewhat schizophrenic claims of the critics* (both individually and in aggregate). In that despite the various claims "it's not about any particular piece of media, it's the trend overall" or "these kinds of depictions are sexist, but it's fine that they exist, they just shouldn't solely exist" inevitably the discussion falls upon particular examples - say a particular catwoman pose, Dragon Crown or Hitman: Leather Nuns Edition and the tone and general sentiment is "this is BAD and should not exist or be consumed". The former's connection to censorship is distal at best and so yours is a reasonable concern in that case, but the latter is far more proximal.
    * I don't know what a good, general term is for each of the "sides" as it were. My general phrase is "radically progressive" but that seems clunky and doesn't necessarily highlight the difference I see between the various camps extant within the forums.

    None of that has any connection to censorship though.

    Like, Roger Ebert is not the Minister for Truth, ruling the moviescape with his jack-thumbed hand. He's just a guy saying "this movie sucks". Saying "this part of this movie is sexist" is no different. It's criticism. It's got nothing to do with censorship.

    I don't follow the logic of your response. I don't think that saying "This game sucks" is at all like saying "this part of the game is sexist" - judgements of quality are a different animal to judgements of the moral character or pernicious effects/politics of some content. Furthermore, in general, saying "this movie sucks" is saying that the movie did not achieve its aims and should have been better not that it was wrong to every try and make it. On the other hand the case against Dragon's Crown was not that it failed, but that it was something that should not have been made at all.

    The position that something shouldn't be made or available and that we should convince others of this may not be censorship, exactly, but the distance between them is not all that great (contrasted to the "it's the proportion, not any particular piece" position where the difference is significant).

  • Apothe0sisApothe0sis Have you ever questioned the nature of your reality? Registered User regular
    Squidget0 wrote: »
    shryke wrote: »
    Squidget0 wrote: »
    Incenjucar wrote: »
    Alinius133 wrote: »
    I haven't read any Catwoman (haven't read comics in a long while) but isn't part of her actual character that she has intentional sex appeal, that she decided upon, and uses it purposefully to seduce people?

    Because seduction is a real thing that people attempt, so unrealistic drawings and body proportions/poses aside, there's a justification to sexualize that character.

    I would say the same is true of Black Widow as well. She actively uses her sexuality as a weapon, and often uses the fact that she is a woman to trick people into underestimating her. Is that sexist art or just art acknowledging the sexism present in the world?

    Sexist is not "a woman wears a sexy outfit to fight crime."

    Sexist is "women are much more likely to use sexy outfits to fight crime than men are."

    Actually, the sexism here is probably that men can't wear sexy outfits to fight crime, because the concept of a male 'sexy outfit' doesn't really exist in the public consciousness. Everyone always makes some joke about how sexy comics men would have giant codpieces, but I don't think those people are actually attracted to giant codpieces. If you ask 10 different people what a sexy man looks like you'll probably get 10 different answers.

    The idea of a 'sexy' male character is a lot more nebulous. When we see celebrities who get a lot of female attention and fans (say, a Tom Hiddleston or Benedict Cumberbatch), their attractiveness tends to rest more on their perceived personality than solely on their appearance or body type. This isn't because men are shallow, it's because as a society we've created different symbols for sexuality across the genders, and we interpret them in different ways. So even if lots of guys wear silly impractical things (like James Bond in a suit or whatever), it still won't get interpreted the same way as it would on a woman.

    If there were some combination of lines an artist could draw that the vast majority of straight women would interpret immediately as 'sexy guy', you'd probably see those lines drawn a lot. There are always artists willing to pander to an eager crowd. That sequence of lines doesn't exist right now, for a lot of really complicated reasons. It's ultimately a bit of a simplification to say that artists should draw something that we, as a society, have no concept for and haven't expressed any great interest in seeing.

    There's sexy male outfits. Something that's tight and shows off their physique is usually what's used.

    So like, spandex? Doesn't almost every male superhero wear that?

    Let's compare spandex worn by male and female super-heroes.

    superman-costume-456.jpg

    faf35-spider-woman_super.jpg?w=266&h=400

    See the difference?

    No.

  • PonyPony Registered User regular
    Sigh.

  • CambiataCambiata Commander Shepard The likes of which even GAWD has never seenRegistered User regular
    Well part of it is stuff like: Why do crowd scenes in film only have 17% women? Are you going to tell me that presenting the image that the world is majority male is an immutable artistic choice, and if we dared to make filmmakers more aware of it and they changed things so that crowd scenes were 50/50 that we'd be destroying art? When films about tech innovators conveniently forget to include roles for the women innovators, is that also an artistic choice that it would be wrong for us to protest against?

    "If you divide the whole world into just enemies and friends, you'll end up destroying everything" --Nausicaa of the Valley of Wind
  • PonyPony Registered User regular
    I'm gonna tag out on this one, I'm all tapped out on my universal translator credits for today, someone else can explain this shit.

  • Apothe0sisApothe0sis Have you ever questioned the nature of your reality? Registered User regular
    Cambiata wrote: »
    I always like to refer to this photo set depicting (potentially NSFW for people in swimsuits) body shapes of athletes for people wondering what else we could POSSIBLY have besides ultra ripped and supermodel. There's a lot of diversity there! And it's actually interesting to see the differences the human body can have!
    Sure, the human body can have a lot of variation, but I don't see the point. We could have lots of things. We could have superman with a beer belly. We could have a 300 pound Catwoman (or more prosaically a gymnast's body). But we're unlikely to find those designs appealing.

    And what is going on with the Rhythmic Gymnast's feet? D:


  • shrykeshryke Member of the Beast Registered User regular
    Apothe0sis wrote: »
    shryke wrote: »
    Apothe0sis wrote: »
    shryke wrote: »
    Why do these kind of discussions always end up in the same place, which people apparently unable to understand that criticism is not censorship?

    It really comes off feeling like some people can't even accept criticism of things they like.

    This is about 7 pages late, but I would suggest that it's due to the vague and somewhat schizophrenic claims of the critics* (both individually and in aggregate). In that despite the various claims "it's not about any particular piece of media, it's the trend overall" or "these kinds of depictions are sexist, but it's fine that they exist, they just shouldn't solely exist" inevitably the discussion falls upon particular examples - say a particular catwoman pose, Dragon Crown or Hitman: Leather Nuns Edition and the tone and general sentiment is "this is BAD and should not exist or be consumed". The former's connection to censorship is distal at best and so yours is a reasonable concern in that case, but the latter is far more proximal.
    * I don't know what a good, general term is for each of the "sides" as it were. My general phrase is "radically progressive" but that seems clunky and doesn't necessarily highlight the difference I see between the various camps extant within the forums.

    None of that has any connection to censorship though.

    Like, Roger Ebert is not the Minister for Truth, ruling the moviescape with his jack-thumbed hand. He's just a guy saying "this movie sucks". Saying "this part of this movie is sexist" is no different. It's criticism. It's got nothing to do with censorship.

    I don't follow the logic of your response. I don't think that saying "This game sucks" is at all like saying "this part of the game is sexist" - judgements of quality are a different animal to judgements of the moral character or pernicious effects/politics of some content. Furthermore, in general, saying "this movie sucks" is saying that the movie did not achieve its aims and should have been better not that it was wrong to every try and make it. On the other hand the case against Dragon's Crown was not that it failed, but that it was something that should not have been made at all.

    The position that something shouldn't be made or available and that we should convince others of this may not be censorship, exactly, but the distance between them is not all that great (contrasted to the "it's the proportion, not any particular piece" position where the difference is significant).

    In what way?

    And when people say something like "Transformers the movie is terrible" they are saying "this movie should exist in a different form. Specifically, one that isn't shit."

    The only difference between "this sucks" and "this is sexist" is specificity. This sucks requires clarification on exactly why it sucks. This is sexist comes pre-clarified. And hell, the reason something sucks may very well be sexism.

  • CambiataCambiata Commander Shepard The likes of which even GAWD has never seenRegistered User regular
    edited September 2014
    Apothe0sis wrote: »
    Squidget0 wrote: »
    shryke wrote: »
    Squidget0 wrote: »
    Incenjucar wrote: »
    Alinius133 wrote: »
    I haven't read any Catwoman (haven't read comics in a long while) but isn't part of her actual character that she has intentional sex appeal, that she decided upon, and uses it purposefully to seduce people?

    Because seduction is a real thing that people attempt, so unrealistic drawings and body proportions/poses aside, there's a justification to sexualize that character.

    I would say the same is true of Black Widow as well. She actively uses her sexuality as a weapon, and often uses the fact that she is a woman to trick people into underestimating her. Is that sexist art or just art acknowledging the sexism present in the world?

    Sexist is not "a woman wears a sexy outfit to fight crime."

    Sexist is "women are much more likely to use sexy outfits to fight crime than men are."

    Actually, the sexism here is probably that men can't wear sexy outfits to fight crime, because the concept of a male 'sexy outfit' doesn't really exist in the public consciousness. Everyone always makes some joke about how sexy comics men would have giant codpieces, but I don't think those people are actually attracted to giant codpieces. If you ask 10 different people what a sexy man looks like you'll probably get 10 different answers.

    The idea of a 'sexy' male character is a lot more nebulous. When we see celebrities who get a lot of female attention and fans (say, a Tom Hiddleston or Benedict Cumberbatch), their attractiveness tends to rest more on their perceived personality than solely on their appearance or body type. This isn't because men are shallow, it's because as a society we've created different symbols for sexuality across the genders, and we interpret them in different ways. So even if lots of guys wear silly impractical things (like James Bond in a suit or whatever), it still won't get interpreted the same way as it would on a woman.

    If there were some combination of lines an artist could draw that the vast majority of straight women would interpret immediately as 'sexy guy', you'd probably see those lines drawn a lot. There are always artists willing to pander to an eager crowd. That sequence of lines doesn't exist right now, for a lot of really complicated reasons. It's ultimately a bit of a simplification to say that artists should draw something that we, as a society, have no concept for and haven't expressed any great interest in seeing.

    There's sexy male outfits. Something that's tight and shows off their physique is usually what's used.

    So like, spandex? Doesn't almost every male superhero wear that?

    Let's compare spandex worn by male and female super-heroes.

    superman-costume-456.jpg

    faf35-spider-woman_super.jpg?w=266&h=400

    See the difference?

    No.

    Just... just don't do this. Don't lie. It's embarrassing. I know you know what the Hawkeye initiative is. There is a clear and unambiguous difference between the way men and women pose in comic books. You know this.

    Like... I dunno man. Is it that the discussion you really want to have is that sexism doesn't exist or isn't as bad as people make it out to be? Is that why you do this stuff? If that's the argument you want to make then shoot, go ahead and do that. I would prefer that to this dog and pony show, personally.

    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
  • JeedanJeedan Registered User regular
    edited September 2014
    Apothe0sis wrote: »
    shryke wrote: »
    Apothe0sis wrote: »
    shryke wrote: »
    Why do these kind of discussions always end up in the same place, which people apparently unable to understand that criticism is not censorship?

    It really comes off feeling like some people can't even accept criticism of things they like.

    This is about 7 pages late, but I would suggest that it's due to the vague and somewhat schizophrenic claims of the critics* (both individually and in aggregate). In that despite the various claims "it's not about any particular piece of media, it's the trend overall" or "these kinds of depictions are sexist, but it's fine that they exist, they just shouldn't solely exist" inevitably the discussion falls upon particular examples - say a particular catwoman pose, Dragon Crown or Hitman: Leather Nuns Edition and the tone and general sentiment is "this is BAD and should not exist or be consumed". The former's connection to censorship is distal at best and so yours is a reasonable concern in that case, but the latter is far more proximal.
    * I don't know what a good, general term is for each of the "sides" as it were. My general phrase is "radically progressive" but that seems clunky and doesn't necessarily highlight the difference I see between the various camps extant within the forums.

    None of that has any connection to censorship though.

    Like, Roger Ebert is not the Minister for Truth, ruling the moviescape with his jack-thumbed hand. He's just a guy saying "this movie sucks". Saying "this part of this movie is sexist" is no different. It's criticism. It's got nothing to do with censorship.

    I don't follow the logic of your response. I don't think that saying "This game sucks" is at all like saying "this part of the game is sexist" - judgements of quality are a different animal to judgements of the moral character or pernicious effects/politics of some content. Furthermore, in general, saying "this movie sucks" is saying that the movie did not achieve its aims and should have been better not that it was wrong to every try and make it. On the other hand the case against Dragon's Crown was not that it failed, but that it was something that should not have been made at all.

    The position that something shouldn't be made or available and that we should convince others of this may not be censorship, exactly, but the distance between them is not all that great (contrasted to the "it's the proportion, not any particular piece" position where the difference is significant).

    Disagree, most of the criticism about Boondock Saints I hear involves the aspect about how its kinda fascist. Its difficult to seriously evaluate it as a movie while totally not-acknowledging that aspect.

    This kind of discussion comes up around movies/books all the time. Imagine reading Atlas Shrugged and trying to review it based on "what its trying to do" totally separately to talking about its actual message. It would be an extremely bizarre kind of analysis.

    With games I think it gets muddled, because people feel theres an onus to evaluate the gameplay/simulation/technical aspects of the game separate to its artistic content. "Review" (as In "if you're looking to purchase a piece of solid FPS action Chootman 4 is on consensus 12% better than CoD") rather than critique.

    Jeedan on
  • CambiataCambiata Commander Shepard The likes of which even GAWD has never seenRegistered User regular
    edited September 2014
    Apothe0sis wrote: »
    Cambiata wrote: »
    I always like to refer to this photo set depicting (potentially NSFW for people in swimsuits) body shapes of athletes for people wondering what else we could POSSIBLY have besides ultra ripped and supermodel. There's a lot of diversity there! And it's actually interesting to see the differences the human body can have!
    Sure, the human body can have a lot of variation, but I don't see the point. We could have lots of things. We could have superman with a beer belly. We could have a 300 pound Catwoman (or more prosaically a gymnast's body). But we're unlikely to find those designs appealing.

    And what is going on with the Rhythmic Gymnast's feet? D:


    Except I find almost all those portrayals in the photo set attractive.*

    And we do have heroes with beer bellies already in media. They're just all men.

    *Edit: But even if I didn't, there's value in having characters that look differently from the norm in media. Because little kids grow up with strange ideas about how they look "wrong" somehow, how they are freaks because their legs are "too thick" or they are "too short" or "too tall" or whatever other thing they are sure is wrong with them. I know this because I was that little girl, comparing my legs to my friends legs and thinking I was fat because of it - and I wasn't! And thinking, like Raven, that no man would want me because of it. And being so grateful to the first men who showed they could be attracted to me that I put up with a lot of bad shit in early relationships! And that's some shitty stuff! Maybe having diverse media wouldn't have stopped those body issues, but it certainly would have helped.

    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
  • CambiataCambiata Commander Shepard The likes of which even GAWD has never seenRegistered User regular
    edited September 2014
    Hey TGS, do you have anything to say about sexism in media right now?

    vSR80iX.jpg

    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
  • Kristmas KthulhuKristmas Kthulhu Currently Kultist Kthulhu Registered User regular
    Cambiata wrote: »
    Well part of it is stuff like: Why do crowd scenes in film only have 17% women? Are you going to tell me that presenting the image that the world is majority male is an immutable artistic choice, and if we dared to make filmmakers more aware of it and they changed things so that crowd scenes were 50/50 that we'd be destroying art? When films about tech innovators conveniently forget to include roles for the women innovators, is that also an artistic choice that it would be wrong for us to protest against?

    From what I understand, it would only be wrong if you tried to convince others of your viewpoint. And then if some of them agreed with you and tried to bring it to others' attention that maybe it's problematic, this whole new collective of people with similar views that have consciously decided they wanted more female representation and in greater variety are suppressing art.

  • NecoNeco Worthless Garbage Registered User regular
    Cambiata wrote: »
    Hey TGS, do you have anything to say about sexism in media right now?

    vSR80iX.jpg

    ...wat

  • Hexmage-PAHexmage-PA Registered User regular
    Apothe0sis wrote: »
    Sure, the human body can have a lot of variation, but I don't see the point. We could have lots of things. We could have superman with a beer belly. We could have a 300 pound Catwoman (or more prosaically a gymnast's body). But we're unlikely to find those designs appealing.

    The question is "why do people find certain body types unappealing?" Part of the answer is cultural. However, for every handful of people who are exclusively attracted to the popularly attractive body types depicted in media there are a few who somehow have developed more uncommon preferences.

This discussion has been closed.