Damsel in Distress: Sarkessian's videos

[Yukar9]

Oh, I'm not saying it makes it any less sickening, but don't confuse malice with stupidity. The writers are trying to go the lazy route, which means following old rather ugly tropes literally verbatim. And I guarantee most of the detractors would agree (even somewhat) if someone made the same argument as Anita Sarkeesian, but wasn't Anita Sarkeesian.

If that is your opinion I fail to see why you joined everyone else in denouncing her video.

[worldruler086]

I didn't so much denounce it as I felt she could have better explained her argument. She ignores context and seems to consider there not being "exceptions" for this trope (for example, John Marston's relationship with his wife, who is obviously the subordinate to him, could be explained by Rockstar wanting to be historically accurate, not being sexist), which is a major problem because she brushes across a bunch of games but doesn't go into detail of why they are doing it wrong. She doesn't even explain what other video game features do (or don't) with these tropes, such as with customizable player characters, the ability to choose the gender of your character, and many other features that are becoming much more ubiquitous in gaming. Also, I was the one who posted this thread. Read my OP, I said I felt she shined the light on this issue but didn't really discuss it properly, but she still started the discussion. I wanted to do the same.

[SilasOfBorg]

If she wanted to do research on the relevance of sexism in gaming (because there is, and it cuts both ways, and I'm with World 100% in that it's mostly lazy, uninspired writing), she could have done a proper scientific study of attitudes in general population and compared them to "gamer" attitudes, perhaps breaking down that category into several subcategories (e.g. "I played frogger once" to "I tried RL once but I didn't like it"), and even then she would only get a possible correlation, not causation.

But ooh, that might have been difficult and possibly given her an answer that didn't fit into her worldview.

So instead, we get this long winded Feminazi rant. So much BS and so little actual "research" that it could easily have been someone parodying ultra-feministic idiocy.

[worldruler086]

A good actual sexist thing would be Sony telling Naughty Dog not to put Ellie on the cover of their new game The Last of Us, even though she's essentially the other protagonist. They did it because of marketting. Men on covers "sell", women don't. Least according to the publishers.

[Yukar9]

I was mostly referring to this post, criticizing you for jumping in with everyone else.

I think in her second video she makes it very clear that she's not criticizing any games in particular, but the trend in general. I personally believe, -and I was given the impression that she believes the same- that individual games using this kind of storyline is not in itself problematic, but that the general trend is the problem. That writers continually resorting to this kind of storyline is the problem.

I fail to see how features such as customizable characters are relevant to this. This is not a criticism of such games.

[Yukar9]

If she wanted to do research on the relevance of sexism in gaming (because there is, and it cuts both ways, and I'm with World 100% in that it's mostly lazy, uninspired writing), she could have done a proper scientific study of attitudes in general population and compared them to "gamer" attitudes, perhaps breaking down that category into several subcategories (e.g. "I played frogger once" to "I tried RL once but I didn't like it"), and even then she would only get a possible correlation, not causation.

But ooh, that might have been difficult and possibly given her an answer that didn't fit into her worldview.

So instead, we get this long winded Feminazi rant. So much BS and so little actual "research" that it could easily have been someone parodying ultra-feministic idiocy.

Because this is not supposed to be scientific research, this is public outreach. There is a very big difference, and I would hope you understood that difference.

Instead of simply dismissing this as a "Feminazi rant," try and give some of your own examples or criticisms of her.

[worldruler086]

I mostly said I agreed with them so they'd actually read my posts. Look at this phrase in particular:

" I agree with you, I just say that if you took the phrase "the gaming industry is male-dominated, and the audience is slowly becoming more equal, and the industry is not keeping up" and asked yourself, "is there truth to this?" I'd say yes. she just has a completely incorrect "why?" to why that is. It is what it is, and it will change as it changes."

In other words, since the gaming industry is transitioning from a male-dominated community to a more equal one, seeing stories that are still male-dominated isn't surprising, but expected. It will change as we wish it to change. Writers continue resorting to bland generic storylines without properly fleshing out the story to me simply seems like bad writing. Not just bad writing, but LAZY writing. We shouldn't be mad at games in general using a specific story set up (other than being worried about over-saturation) but games that us that specific storyline generically. And I feel that not only have games used "damsel in distress" as a story set up, but using said story set up generically has been done for CENTURIES. It's in our culture to be familiar with the story, so when developers want a simple story so more story-oriented players will have a reason to brutally murder Bowser, they'll go for the cheap shot by saying "oh, they took the princess lady too". Oh, and saving Mushroom Kingdom. Honestly I'm just as tired as seeing "save the world" being a reason to play as well. I'll go more over this later. I need to head off to work.

[U_B]

I only watched the first video, which I thought was pretty interesting until she jumped from Apple ][ games and their rereleases to commentary on the modern gaming world, can someone tell me if she fills in the space between in the second?

[Yukar9]

I've no doubt it's been used for centuries. I'm well aware that writers who use it mostly do it out of laziness, rather than blatant misogyny. Anita also clearly states this in her second video. I disagree on not being mad at these games, although I probably wouldn't use the word 'mad'. I'm saying we should criticize games who use this storyline too much and without justification.

[SilasOfBorg]

Because this is not supposed to be scientific research, this is public outreach. There is a very big difference, and I would hope you understood that difference.

Instead of simply dismissing this as a "Feminazi rant," try and give some of your own examples or criticisms of her.

"not research"? Really? She did her very best to give the impression that she had "scientifically" gone through the available literature, that she had spent a "lot of time" coming to her conclusions, in a rational, unbiased manner.

What she actually did was the opposite of science -- she asserted that rampant sexism / objectification / <insert evil Patriarchal thing> in video games was bad because it affects how we treat each other in real life. She then failed to give any proof whatsoever of that causative assertion, and instead ranted about how games were sexist and treated women poorly, which I think most people would agree with, except that I would add that video games have also been known to portray men poorly and in stereotypical fashions as well.

Video games and books and other escapist pursuits aren't known to be bastions of realism. We like to escape realism from time to time. Some creators, in their laziness to create these escapes for us, resort to stereotypes and tropes because they "get the job done". You could argue that this alone is "bad" for us somehow, but you'd be a total idiot. Who cares about our escapes and fantasies, unless our consumption of these affects our interactions in real life? And she totally failed to deliver on that. Totally, 100% failed. Did not even try.

And so her rant was nothing more than "here's 23 minutes of my long winded opinion". And it wasn't even a *good* rant. It was factually incorrect in places, glossing over things that might have made her opinion fairer or less biased.

Anyway, I don't think I'm going to be able to express myself any better than that. Hope you enjoyed my rant.

;)