Well put.
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8 Things Anita Sarkeesian Wants To Change About Video Games
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Well put.
The problem is the harshest critics of her pieces, from people the think and act like ducman, haven't actually watched her videos. They're pulling things from youtube from people with axes to grind...some of whom are openly, explicitly *not* gamers (which makes this whole No True Scotsman fallacy even more ridiculous in its hilarity). I wouldn't expect many to follow the link you posted, just a hunch.
I not only quoted you, but used that word for word to explain the failure of your logic... which you conveniently failed to quote.
By your own words, you want someone you can relate to in all media, so a white girl needs to listen to white girls on the radio, white girls in movies, and white girls in video games. She can't just relate to a person because of other qualities that she sees in herself... right.
And even if we accept that you are absolutely correct, then the same rules apply for boys. If you are ordering pizzas, and the boys primarily want pepperoni pizza and the girls primarily want vegetarian pizza, do you order 50% pepps/vegetarian when there are 9 boys for every girl at the table? To be fair, you'd order 9 pepperoni pizzas for every vegetarian pizza.
There are after all as I have shown a multitude of "feminist-friendly" video games already on the market for years and years now, so the fact that there are also a lot of games that cater towards heterosexual males and fact that there are a lot more of them in the market shouldn't be an issue.
If anything, my posts are far too wordy... so please explain to the class where I talked about "reverse-sexism". Don't get me wrong, I understand the appeal of straw-men arguments, but as you said, "Don't be stupid".
Cliffs Notes for the TL;DR crew:
1) If female gamers are a large portion of the market, speaking with their wallets is all that is needed and there are a multitude of feminist-friendly games already on the market and in development. The more these feminist-friendly games sell, the more will be made. This is capitalism 101 here. If female gamers are a small portion of the market (with feminine non-violent games not selling in as high of numbers), they should expect that there will be a smaller portion of games that specifically cater to their wants.
2) If male gamers are a significant portion of the market, then its logical that they have games that are created for them, as like you say "media is a mirror, and we want someone that we can relate to when we're playing around with it." That can mean a male protagonists, that the heterosexual male can relate to, with the types of activities that many males are attracted to which yes includes power fantasies involving violence and scantily clad women with crazy breast physics. We've shown this isn't EVERY game, but if power-trip fantasy games like Grand Theft Auto sell well, then clearly there's a big market!
You noticed I'm in this thread? Thanks, but I guessed you missed my response to you that there supposedly aren't any feminist-friendly games on the market that Anita and her followers could go out and buy, and since there are so very many of them, have their wallets do the talking. Top selling games tend to breed games like them... not exactly rocket science:
But you realize that the top selling game of all time is Grand Theft Auto? If female gamers are a large segment of the gamer population, over 50% according to feminists, then they obviously like games like GTA and disagree with you feminists. Or it could just be that most gamers are male.Ducman69 said:
It's not a zero sum game.
This might come across and some high level analysis, but it really is possible to include male and female heroes in a game, and to make well-written backstories for the female "props" in the games that are being developed "for boys" without too much drama.
This might come across and some high level analysis, but it really is possible to include male and female heroes in a game, and to make well-written backstories for the female "props" in the games that are being developed "for boys" without too much drama.
Which is done for some games, but not all games. Can you understand that individual games can exist that cater towards the 90%, just as there are some games that cater to the 10%? This might come across as highly confusing to you, but much of what you feminists demand is also MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVE.
If you accept that most gamers are heterosexual males, then you should recognize that many of those males not only "don't mind" so called tropes, but they enjoy them. Some like identifying as a hero that rescues a female love interest. Some like women being sexy and scantily dressed because eye candy is pleasurable. Some like things that Anita considers "gross" like shooting people. So what right do feminists have to dictate to heterosexual gamers what fantasies they are and aren't allowed to like? That is what we're talking about here, since we've shown there are no lack of games that are feminist-friendly, and whats under contention is that there are games that do not meet their stamp of approval and aren't designed for that market segment.
Or do you believe that Anita doesn't mind if many games cater towards the wants of heterosexual male gamers? Because that's absolutely ludicrous, as she tolerate no such thing in gaming which she has made abundantly clear.
Well, from what she has stated repeatedly, and numerous people have quoted her to demonstrate to you, but you ignore repeatedly in this thread and others it appears as that she not only thinks it's great that there are many games out there for many tastes, but that's a different thing from what she personally enjoys.
The problem with this dialog is that you consistently shove your opinions about what you think other people believe down their throats and make it seem like they're the ones making the statement...like you do with Anita and you did with your latest post about my supposed (fabricated) position on the topic.
It's your go-to MO so I don't get surprised by it. You've already started to cross your usual line of personal insult so everyone bothering to read this thread at this point might as well brace themselves the usual slew of filth you're about to generate from this point on as your position becomes increasingly less stable.
Lets summarize here:
1) You now accept that most gamers are heterosexual males, and that whatever fantasies they have are legitimate to play out in video games; and I add that logically a majority of games would cater to the majority demand.
2) You accept that there are a multitude of existing feminist-friendly games on the market, as I even listed a multitude which you have no problem with; and I add that the market caters to demand so if feminists want more feminist-friendly games they need to buy more.
3) You accept that every individual game not only need not but in some cases CAN not be both feminist-friendly while meeting the fantasies of heterosexual males.
4) You ignore that Anita has declared that she doesn't like games and isn't a fan, doesn't know anything about games and had to research them, and thinks that shooters are "gross", while four years later claiming she is a fan of games with a long history of gaming as being mutually exclusive. You also fail to acknowledge why with years of time on her hands and a $160K budget why she has to steal her sample footage in her videos from other youtuber's "lets play" videos, which strongly implies that she hasn't even played the games through herself to be able to use her own footage, especially when you consider that she takes videos completely out of context which is extremely misleading.
5) You claim that Anita tolerates that there is room for feminist-unfriendly games, and yet she has video after video that attacks specific games and developers for being feminist-unfriendly; and I add that worse yet that most of her accusations are nonsense mini-clips taken completely out of context regardless of which I have provided three example games previously. So when she bitches and moans about Grand Theft Auto about how its " insane and wrong" and "celebrates sexism" and how harmful a game like that is to society, how is she not only allowing for but applauding diversity for some feminist-unfriendly games to exist?
CreepyUncleGoogle
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It wasn't stable to begin with.
lilbabycat
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And you've never done that.
I keep wondering...
If there even was before, there is no shortage of "feminist friendly" games now. I don't see a single video from Anita analyzing games that "do things right", or anything attempting to let her followers know "look things are changing, we're doing it!" Where are these FeministFrequency videos? All I see is trope this and misogyny that, with most of her criticisms being totally inaccurate (most recently, her Dying Light criticisms).
The lack of these kinds of things from Anita raises a bunch of red flags for me. Or is her agenda here to not stop until 100% of games are driven by what she considers to be acceptable? Sure sounds like equality to me.
If there even was before, there is no shortage of "feminist friendly" games now. I don't see a single video from Anita analyzing games that "do things right", or anything attempting to let her followers know "look things are changing, we're doing it!" Where are these FeministFrequency videos? All I see is trope this and misogyny that, with most of her criticisms being totally inaccurate (most recently, her Dying Light criticisms).
The lack of these kinds of things from Anita raises a bunch of red flags for me. Or is her agenda here to not stop until 100% of games are driven by what she considers to be acceptable? Sure sounds like equality to me.
Her "agenda" is to bring to light that some of these issues are occurring in mainstream gaming. The responses shown here in this thread, among other places, and the outright denials that this occurs at all or that it's any kind of a problem, is evidence enough of her claim that problems exist in the genre. Her "agenda" is backed up by game developers themselves agreeing with her, being thankful for the insight of how some of their projects have unintentionally offended and alienated a potential audience, and then making changes to their games. The people taking issue with this are a small subset of "gamers" and some really vocal non-gamers who crawled out of the woodwork to rile the gamers up over issues they've been whining about in mainstream for a long time already. It's an unfortunate testament to the myopia of some gamers that they weren't even aware of what those spokespeople stood for before they riled the gamers up over a topic they don't even give a shit about.
Hate to point out that you keep jumping on tangents and never supporting your own statements. You said that Anita is happy with their being diversity in gaming, and that there is room for there to be games on the market that cater towards the fantasies of heterosexual males. And you don't seem to contest that heterosexual males make up the bulk of the market, not only now but historically. You also haven't contested that there are PLENTY of feminist-friendly games already on the market to buy, and it follows that the more feminists enter gaming the more they will buy up those feminist-friendly games and the more games like them will dominate the market. So WHAT EXACTLY is broken again?
Whats broken, according to Anita, as seen by her criticism of ANY video game that she believes caters towards heterosexual male fantasies, is that there are games on the market that aren't feminist-friendly, and there shouldn't be. Its either simple Al-Sharpton/Michael Moore controversy profiteering (of which she's doing very well so far), or in the case of her supporters more social engineering. They want to change what the "evil white CIS males" are allowed to play.
All extremest are wrong.
NRA, PETA, ISIS, Left Wingers, Right Wingers, and obviously feminist.
When you take your point to the extreme and ignore any and everything that doesn't fuel your agenda you lose all real validity.
Is their sexism in games? Yes
Does it go both ways? Yes
Is it a problem? Nope
Should women play a bigger role and be less stereotypical in video games? Sure why not
Would doing this increase sales? Nope
Does sex sell? Yep
Are 50ish% of people who play any type of video game female? Yes
Are 50ish% of people who identify themselves as gamers and play "AAA" titles female? No
Is sexism in gaming worse then other mediums? No
I could go on? Sure
will I go on? Nope
NRA, PETA, ISIS, Left Wingers, Right Wingers, and obviously feminist.
When you take your point to the extreme and ignore any and everything that doesn't fuel your agenda you lose all real validity.
Is their sexism in games? Yes
Does it go both ways? Yes
Is it a problem? Nope
Should women play a bigger role and be less stereotypical in video games? Sure why not
Would doing this increase sales? Nope
Does sex sell? Yep
Are 50ish% of people who play any type of video game female? Yes
Are 50ish% of people who identify themselves as gamers and play "AAA" titles female? No
Is sexism in gaming worse then other mediums? No
I could go on? Sure
will I go on? Nope
chockomonkey
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Anita supports never seem to have any comment on the valid criticisms brought against her and her critiques, especially Anita herself who won't acknowledge the opposite side of the debate.
Even the blogger who MostComfortable linked us to did the same thing!
http://www.zenofdesign.com/i-watch-anita-sarkeesian-so-you-dont-have-to-but-you-should/
I have watched one Anita video, and what I saw was her taking short clips completely out of context and ranting on them. Ducman brought this up multiple times in this thread but no one ever wants to comment on it! Prime example is her critique of Hitman. But anyway... I tried acknowledging the valid points of her supporters when distilled by MostComfortable, but alas if her supporters won't do the same, this conversation will go nowhere.
Well done! I'd say that's a pretty good thread ender.
Even the blogger who MostComfortable linked us to did the same thing!
http://www.zenofdesign.com/i-watch-anita-sarkeesian-so-you-dont-have-to-but-you-should/
Riiiiiight.
I have watched one Anita video, and what I saw was her taking short clips completely out of context and ranting on them. Ducman brought this up multiple times in this thread but no one ever wants to comment on it! Prime example is her critique of Hitman. But anyway... I tried acknowledging the valid points of her supporters when distilled by MostComfortable, but alas if her supporters won't do the same, this conversation will go nowhere.
Well done! I'd say that's a pretty good thread ender.
Youn
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"Wait, I'm an extremely nice person."
"GO AWAY YOU CHILD MOLESTER!!!"
"GO AWAY YOU CHILD MOLESTER!!!"
I can't speak for others, but I don't see that she needs defending or attacking. I just care about the 8 items listed.
Well, duh. Because any critique counts as harassment, and why should they encourage it!?
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Zarathustra[H]
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Well, duh. Because any critique counts as harassment, and why should they encourage it!?
Yep, if you have a reasoned, fact based disagreement with a feminist, you are now sea lion king, and sea lion king is harassment.
Or even worse. Diagaree and you are a "rape apologist"...
I have severe qualms about any movement that is unwilling to have reasoned fact based discussions.
Call us when your fact based critiques can be heard over the crazy misogyny
Because I disagree with her videos and I think most of her critiques are nitpicky nonsense. But the response to them has been so bad that I find myself having to defend her instead of discussing her videos
The morons got so mad they changed the discussion from what she was saying to what they were saying in response. Too bad. Its over. Find something else to disagree with.
Its just like gamer gate.
Because I disagree with her videos and I think most of her critiques are nitpicky nonsense. But the response to them has been so bad that I find myself having to defend her instead of discussing her videos
The morons got so mad they changed the discussion from what she was saying to what they were saying in response. Too bad. Its over. Find something else to disagree with.
Its just like gamer gate.
Which part of:
1) There are a ton of feminist-friendly games on the market that abide by her guidelines, go buy them if you want more like them. Or heck even crowdfund one, where you're an empowered heroine kicking disgusting white CIS males in the balls until they learn to check their privilege.
2) Not every single game SHOULD be femi-nazi approved, and I love the fact we can have politically incorrect fantasy games like Grand Theft Auto (as do a lot of people, since its a top selling game). They don't need to go away, and nothing is broken about them.
3) Pointing out that she steals gameplay footage from youtubers to throw around the "mysoginy! patriarchy! oppression!" nonsense rather than playing the games through herself and using her own footage, to then grossly misrepresent games by taking tiny scene snippets out of context is pretty damn factual, and has been backed up in detail.
I imagine you may be hoping for this:
But IMO by defending a profiteering controversy scam artist like Anita, using more or less the justification that "she may be wrong, but you guys have been too critical of her, so I support her out of spite" is pretty damn silly.
Why not support this woman raising money for real female victims instead:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Z85GQF9--s
The really sad part of that is you are just now learning that women are raped in this country at such alarming frequencies that they don't make mainstream news...not because she worked in the sex industry.
Women being harassed in relation to tech --> news
Women being raped on college campuses --> news
Women being raped in the streets or their homes --> not news
Just like you don't see burglaries or gang murders in the news anymore -- not because they aren't happening anymore but because they happen so often that it's not considered newsworthy by mainstream media
to use one tragedy to bludgeon another's woman's pain is extraordinarily horrific, in my opinion. That you see nothing wrong with that kind of behavior is indicative of the deeper issues some of these feminists are trying to discuss in the public milieu
Women being harassed in relation to tech --> news
Women being raped on college campuses --> news
Women being raped in the streets or their homes --> not news
Just like you don't see burglaries or gang murders in the news anymore -- not because they aren't happening anymore but because they happen so often that it's not considered newsworthy by mainstream media
to use one tragedy to bludgeon another's woman's pain is extraordinarily horrific, in my opinion. That you see nothing wrong with that kind of behavior is indicative of the deeper issues some of these feminists are trying to discuss in the public milieu
M76
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This don't even make sense, more or less girl or woman? WTF?
Better yet let me dress my own character. A game can easily fail on a bad looking protagonist.
Like if not all male characters have muscular bodies in all games. There is no inequality here.
Is this really an existing problem? I don't think so. She just said she wants various body types, a huge ass is one body type.
NO, include characters that fit the story, the setting, and the era. There shouldn't be a rule that you must include one gay feller, one black chick, one latino, and you're making a game set in nazi germany.
I've seen the way normal women move, this is again not a real problem.
Who in their right mind would associte orgasms to pain? I never ever noticed this not even slightly in any game. She probably never watched a female tennis match ever. Compared to that game soundbites are the mildest things.
If they were included she would make a speech about women haters living out their fantasies and such. I think there are more female enemies in games than there are female thugs in real life compared to male ones.
Just because someone has a few small grains of truth in their statements among a pack of blatant lies and exaggerations doesn't mean you support them. Especially when that person is a Proven pathological liar and scam artist like her. You don't defend a person like this..EVER. Her videos aren't nitpicky nonsense, if that is all you think of them you haven't watched them or understood what she was saying. She is a con artist and she is manipulating people who can't be bothered to actually inform themselves and that makes her message extremely dangerous.
CreepyUncleGoogle
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This thread kinda helps me understand why gamers grief each other so much and then talk about delicious tears. Yeah, there's some sorta issue and people are talking about it. Yup, if someone advocates something it's totally doubtless that someone else is gonna not agree with it. The tearful lashing out about something so utterly unimportant, while totally gold when it comes to comedy (and maybe that's what makes gamer tears delicious), is just crazy-cakes silly. If you're a gamer, shut up and play video games.
NO, don't start that. Rape has been going down over the past 20 years, Along with violent crime. Even rainn acknowledges that. But just because some people don't agree with the numbers doesn't mean they are wrong, and it doesn't excuse the fudging of numbers to make sexual assault look higher than it really is.
lilbabycat
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Or because certain people have decided to twist the definition of "rape" to encompass any sexual contact that isn't accompanied by a signed contract. You were in the thread, you were one of those jackasses.
Huh? The point was that its a real victim, instead of an imagined victim. Its the difference between an actual sports foul, and your professional victim Anita and her feminists that flop more than professional soccer players.
I'm guessing you also didn't watch her video, or do you have an opinion about how she calls out Anita as a bullshit scam artist that gives two craps about anything but selling controversy to her flock of man-hating hens?
And I noticed you are still avoiding the question... why is it acceptable that Anita appears to not have played the games through that she's calling out, that she takes tiny snippets of videos stolen from other youtuber's "let's play" videos out of context to be blatantly misleading (which her supporters don't know, as they don't play the games either) when she has had years and so much money thrown at her for the cause (not to mention all her paid appearances at lectures and even the Colbert Report), and you still haven't refuted that there are plenty of feminist-friendly games on the market for Anita and her supporters to buy, and seem to agree that its OK for games to exist that cater towards heterosexual men's fantasies which is something that Anita by attacking ANY game that isn't femi-nazi approved does not. As was said, if there actually are more than a handful of actual feminist gamers in the market, buy the myriad of feminist-friendly games already out or fund-raise development of more and you'll see more made as no market tolerates a vacuum. But untwist your panties and realize that not every single game in existence has to match your brand of political correctness, so stop trying to control what I'm allowed to play.
Which part of:
1) There are a ton of feminist-friendly games on the market that abide by her guidelines, go buy them if you want more like them. Or heck even crowdfund one, where you're an empowered heroine kicking disgusting white CIS males in the balls until they learn to check their privilege.
2) Not every single game SHOULD be femi-nazi approved, and I love the fact we can have politically incorrect fantasy games like Grand Theft Auto (as do a lot of people, since its a top selling game). They don't need to go away, and nothing is broken about them.
3) Pointing out that she steals gameplay footage from youtubers to throw around the "mysoginy! patriarchy! oppression!" nonsense rather than playing the games through herself and using her own footage, to then grossly misrepresent games by taking tiny scene snippets out of context is pretty damn factual, and has been backed up in detail.
I imagine you may be hoping for this:
But IMO by defending a profiteering controversy scam artist like Anita, using more or less the justification that "she may be wrong, but you guys have been too critical of her, so I support her out of spite" is pretty damn silly.
Why not support this woman raising money for real female victims instead:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Z85GQF9--s
Why not attack politicians trying to ban video games instead? Cuz that's not the topic of this thread?
If you're being an asshole, me calling you an asshole is not white knighting. I doubt a white knight would call her videos dumb.
My point is the well is poisoned. You pick a new target to criticize or you get lumped in with the nutball misogynists. That's how it works unfortunately.
Actually it is, when the ones clamoring for censorship are third-wave feminists. But you didn't watch the video did you? She specifically addresses how Anita Sarkeesian is a fraud, unjustly attacking gamers and the video game industry.
So which points specifically brought up so far do you consider being an "asshole"? Or is it not about WHAT is said, but about HOW its said... lol!
Actually it is, when the ones clamoring for censorship are third-wave feminists. But you didn't watch the video did you? She specifically addresses how Anita Sarkeesian is a fraud, unjustly attacking gamers and the video game industry.
So which points specifically brought up so far do you consider being an "asshole"? Or is it not about WHAT is said, but about HOW its said... lol!
You really are quite hopeless
Comixbooks
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The more I read about Anita the more I like her =) She has a point doesn't matter if you don't agree.
Hitler had a point too and he didn't really care too much for the people who didn't agree either.
this thread as now been properly Godwined.
lilbabycat
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14 pages is an accomplishment.
The entire liberal philosophy is based on the vilification of the white, heterosexual male.
CreepyUncleGoogle
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There are a lot of old white guys who are liberals. While I personally don't care about politics, I think the sheer number of inappropriate insults and slurs used to refer to sexually permissive women, homosexuals, or African Americans each individually FAR outnumbers the number of insulting words associated with straight, white guys. Besides that, straight guys are behind most of the violent crime in the US.
WTF does that have to do with video games. Video games are depictions. It's an art.
Video games are not real violence, unlike american football. Where over 200 kids a year die playing high school football. We don't scream about that. It asinine to complain about depictions of violence and misogyny in video games when there is actual real violence and real misogyny in the real world.
lilbabycat
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None of this does. Avoiding the point is the whole goal. Deflect from who absurd the arguments are until you can defend the deflected-to point. Several people in here in experts at it. Some people here have a PhD in it. It is literally their job.
Most domestic violence in LGBT community is from lesbians and not gay men. Please stop quoting statistics without validation of the overall demographics.