Tropes vs. Women Author Driven From Home

[Blue_Max]

This no-name developer from a no-name studio interviewed by a no-name website nicely sums up my feelings on the broader manner.

http://techraptor.net/2014/09/12/interview-daniel-vavra/

"Have you ever seen any of them in direct confrontation with their opponents? I guess you didn’t, because they only know how to bark at others from behind the fence and then how to play victims when somebody barks back."

Ahhhh.... beautifully said. And a great article overall! :awe: Thanks, GR!

 

[thedosbox]

Not that it'll make any difference to those who insist the threats were faked:

https://twitter.com/Nero/status/510485248992608256

Wonder how long it'll take for someone to accuse the FBI of collusion to "ruin" gaming.

In plenty of games the plot just doesn't matter much. Do you think people play Mario for its plot of rescuing the princess?

Missing the point - the trope is "women as background decoration", but nice of you to list three examples from the 52 games she listed.

This no-name developer from a no-name studio interviewed by a no-name website nicely sums up my feelings on the broader manner.

http://techraptor.net/2014/09/12/interview-daniel-vavra/

Love the talk of censorship when he's able to get publicity for his kickstarter game by speaking out. Oh wait, that's exactly what Sarkeesian is doing - and she's the troll? Huh.

Almost admire the attempted deflection about misogyny in the industry though, especially when the topic is representation of women in games. Yet another example of the insecure thinking that others are out to "ruin" games.

 

[BoberFett]

 

[nehalem256]

Missing the point - the trope is "women as background decoration", but nice of you to list three examples from the 52 games she listed.

Am I suppose to go over 52 games?:hmm:

I for one am going nowhere near a feminist literature discussion. It may be "only a game", but I still have to sleep.

On 2nd thought I kinda like the thought of a Hitman mission that involves sneaking past a feminist literature discussion in order to assassinate a feminist leader

Somehow I don't think Anita would find that to be an improvement

 

[werepossum]

I don't know about you, but I play games to get away from real life. I can't stand the Sims or anything mundane like that. I want to take risks that I can't in real life, die a hundred deaths, shoot hundreds of terrorists in face, etc. So you know, when I had the opportunity to have some gay sex with an elf in Dragon Age, you better believe I gave him the night of his life.

Personally, the idea that games must be politically correct and feminist approved sounds even worse than a night of gay sex with an elf in Dragon Age.

Am I suppose to go over 52 games?:hmm:

On 2nd thought I kinda like the thought of a Hitman mission that involves sneaking past a feminist literature discussion in order to assassinate a feminist leader

Somehow I don't think Anita would find that to be an improvement

lol Probably not.

 

[Sulaco]

While standing in line at the grocery store today reading my issue of Cosmo (it was the "SEX ISSUE! 65 Ways to Make Him Want You in the Sack"), I was outraged to see the harlequin romance novels written by mostly women, with an audience of predominantly women, are always objectifying men! Every time I walk by I see a shirtless fireman, or cowboy, or soldier, or rodeo clown, or postal worker with rippling abs and huge biceps! It's outrageous and makes me feel like a piece of meat.

I just want a dialogue about this. I just fail to see why some of these books largely written by females for an overwhelming female audience continue to incorporate things that appeal to many female readers.

 

[Blue_Max]

While standing in line at the grocery store today reading my issue of Cosmo (it was the "SEX ISSUE! 65 Ways to Make Him Want You in the Sack"), I was outraged to see the harlequin romance novels written by mostly women, with an audience of predominantly women, are always objectifying men! Every time I walk by I see a shirtless fireman, or cowboy, or soldier, or rodeo clown, or postal worker with rippling abs and huge biceps! It's outrageous and makes me feel like a piece of meat.

I just want a dialogue about this. I just fail to see why some of these books largely written by females for an overwhelming female audience continue to incorporate things that appeal to many female readers.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4JA4EPRbWhQ

 

[lilrayray69]

This is still going on?

I mean the fact is a lot of games, especially in the past, are/were made by males, particularly white males. People have the tendency to put characters like themselves in whatever they create. When you're a kid and a young white male, you typically draw pictures of white people, mostly male. When you read a book, you probably imagine the characters in your head as being white, just kind of by 'default'. I'm white, but I would guess if you are black you'd imagine most characters as black, and so on. I think that's really mostly what has been going on.

More diversity in games requires more diversity in those who are creating them, which is occurring today. Now I'm not sure if women have a difficult time getting into the industry or not - there's of course this 1 example here with "GamerGate" involving a woman and accusing her of sleeping around I guess, but this is just one case.

Maybe someone's already looked into this in detail and I missed it.

 

[thedosbox]

While standing in line at the grocery store today reading my issue of Cosmo (it was the "SEX ISSUE! 65 Ways to Make Him Want You in the Sack"), I was outraged to see the harlequin romance novels written by mostly women, with an audience of predominantly women, are always objectifying men! Every time I walk by I see a shirtless fireman, or cowboy, or soldier, or rodeo clown, or postal worker with rippling abs and huge biceps! It's outrageous and makes me feel like a piece of meat.

I just want a dialogue about this. I just fail to see why some of these books largely written by females for an overwhelming female audience continue to incorporate things that appeal to many female readers.

So, it's bad to stereotype "gamers" as a bunch of angry nerd-virgins, but it's OK to stereotype women?

No hypocrisy in that argument at all

More diversity in games requires more diversity in those who are creating them, which is occurring today. Now I'm not sure if women have a difficult time getting into the industry or not - there's of course this 1 example here with "GamerGate" involving a woman and accusing her of sleeping around I guess, but this is just one case.

Maybe someone's already looked into this in detail and I missed it.

http://www.develop-online.net/news/kim-swift-s-rallying-call-against-industry-sexism/0113713

 

[Nebor]

So, it's bad to stereotype "gamers" as a bunch of angry nerd-virgins, but it's OK to stereotype women?

Those of us that live in the real world realize it's OK to stereotype everyone.

 

[werepossum]

This is still going on?

I mean the fact is a lot of games, especially in the past, are/were made by males, particularly white males. People have the tendency to put characters like themselves in whatever they create. When you're a kid and a young white male, you typically draw pictures of white people, mostly male. When you read a book, you probably imagine the characters in your head as being white, just kind of by 'default'. I'm white, but I would guess if you are black you'd imagine most characters as black, and so on. I think that's really mostly what has been going on.

More diversity in games requires more diversity in those who are creating them, which is occurring today. Now I'm not sure if women have a difficult time getting into the industry or not - there's of course this 1 example here with "GamerGate" involving a woman and accusing her of sleeping around I guess, but this is just one case.

Maybe someone's already looked into this in detail and I missed it.

Maybe it is because I only play first person, but the race and sex of my character are completely unimportant to me.

So, it's bad to stereotype "gamers" as a bunch of angry nerd-virgins, but it's OK to stereotype women?

No hypocrisy in that argument at all



http://www.develop-online.net/news/kim-swift-s-rallying-call-against-industry-sexism/0113713

That swooshing sound was Sulaco's point going over your head. Granted, it passed so far above you might have missed it, but still.

 

[Sulaco]

So, it's bad to stereotype "gamers" as a bunch of angry nerd-virgins, but it's OK to stereotype women?

No hypocrisy in that argument at all



http://www.develop-online.net/news/kim-swift-s-rallying-call-against-industry-sexism/0113713

If that were any higher over your head it would be in orbit.

 

[Blue_Max]

So, it's bad to stereotype "gamers" as a bunch of angry nerd-virgins, but it's OK to stereotype women?

No hypocrisy in that argument at all

Dang... picture failed. Oh well.. not worth the effort.

 

[MongGrel]

Just let this thread die would ya

 

[thedosbox]

If that were any higher over your head it would be in orbit.

No need to take you seriously when you seem to believe that a dick is required to create or play games.

Anyhow, it seems the threats continue in the "real" world:

 

[GoodRevrnd]

You have a one sided claim that they actually did something that constituted harassment, and assuming they were harassing, you're saying there is a systemic problem because the gamer equivalent of the Wetboro Baptist Church is making a bunch of noise.

It's funny too, because these types of events for any cause tend to physically bring out plenty of noisy opponents making themselves known.

 

[zerogear]

StarDock Dev: http://www.littletinyfrogs.com/article/457741/GamerGatethe_free_ride_is_over

 

[norseamd]

Brad Wardell probably needs to consider keeping out of this given his past problems.

 

[GeorgePatton]

This story makes me feel very sad to be a 'gamer'. I enjoy a lot of the games that she critiques, and I can certainly see her viewpoint. I don't agree with everything she says, but she does make some valid arguments, in my opinion. Unfortunately, even if you disagree with her 100%, threatening violence to her and her family is just ridiculous. If anything, that type of response validates her opinion even more. Sad.

Mods - I felt this was appropriate to put in the PCG area, but move if you feel necessary.

http://www.pcgamer.com/2014/08/28/tropes-vs-women-in-video-games-creator-driven-from-her-home-by-online-threats-and-abuse/

She slept with game reviewers and now shes trying to turn this into some kind of sexism crusade to deflect what she did. She deserves everything that is coming to her.

 

[thedosbox]

She slept with game reviewers and now shes trying to turn this into some kind of sexism crusade to deflect what she did. She deserves everything that is coming to her.

LMAO - you can't even get your accusations straight! Nobody has accused Sarkeesian of sleeping with game reviewers. She doesn't even develop games!

 

[norseamd]

LMAO - you can't even get your accusations straight! Nobody has accused Sarkeesian of sleeping with game reviewers. She doesn't even develop games!

Yes they have.

Which basically shows how you love to stick to the same propaganda and adapt shallowly to the current discussion without ever swaying from your overall platform.

Your post is nothing but false cause and texas sharpshooter.

 

[norseamd]

A challenge for everyone!

Go see if you can count how many times Anita Sarkeesian makes fallacies in her video shit that she pukes on everyone.

I am interested if you could even come up with an idea of how much shit there is. I for one am not going to watch hours of shit just to find out.

 

[jruchko]

Brad Wardell probably needs to consider keeping out of this given his past problems.

His past problems are that he was falsely accused of sexual harassment and then got a ton of harassment from the "SJW" side. That makes him clearly biased in this whole thing, but there is nothing wrong with speaking up about it.

 

[werepossum]

No need to take you seriously when you seem to believe that a dick is required to create or play games.

Anyhow, it seems the threats continue in the "real" world:

Wow, you really are a special little pony. His point was not even slightly about penises (penii?) and their relative utility or lack thereof in creating or playing games. His point was that such objectification is ubiquitous because people want to sell product and that sells, to men AND to women, and therefore Ms. Sarkeesian is being a giant hypocritical Dickinsian (see, I added the 'insian' because this is the gaming board) to pretend otherwise. If she truly wishes to fix the world for women, she needs to understand that women are already part of the world.

You have a one sided claim that they actually did something that constituted harassment, and assuming they were harassing, you're saying there is a systemic problem because the gamer equivalent of the Westboro Baptist Church is making a bunch of noise.

It's funny too, because these types of events for any cause tend to physically bring out plenty of noisy opponents making themselves known.

Yep. I'd go even further and suggest that the gamer equivalent of the Westboro Baptist Church is making a bunch of noise at the other gamer equivalent of the Westboro Baptist Church.

Luckily as there are more female gamers today than male gamers, more developers are trying to figure out what an enriching slice of these females really want. The result will be not only better options for women gamers, but also increasing irrelevance for Ms. Sarkeesian - assuming that's even mathematically possible.

 

[mikeymikec]

Watch Thunderf00ts videos on her to understand why people hate her so much. She is intellectually dishonest and a professional victim.

I watched the first thunderf00t video posted on this thread. It was about 10 minutes long, approximately 6 of those minutes were spent repeating the same point two or three times, included some inexplicable quoted comments (inexplicable without context), and somehow he managed to miss her probable point/opinion about the Watch Dogs scene that the traffiking content was an excuse to show a bit of nudity.

I also found the "disabling YT comments" bit amusing, as if YT comment threads are typical sources of intelligent discourse on any topic.

If the context for the scenes from the Hitman game he included are as he described then I would agree that he has a point there and perhaps she is either intentionally misrepresenting them or her opinion is the result of a biassed prejudicial perspective (ie. whenever she sees female nudity (or degrees of) in games it 'sets her off'), etc. However, she's posted many videos on the topic of sexism in gaming, she's bound to have posted something incorrect in one of them, just like any one of us will very likely have posted something incorrect on the Internet at some point; it's how she would react to someone pointing this out in a non-douchy fashion that's important after she's made a mistake.

So out of the two Thunderf00t videos I've watched, he comes across as an extremely ranty individual who doesn't make his points very well. This was the second one I watched:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FWxAljFlb-c

I found this one amusing because within 5 seconds of the start of the video, he's already gone into rant mode and lost objectivity for this simple reason:

If an 'ism' has a large enough following, there is going to be an increasing variation of opinion as to what that 'ism' is about. A very basic example of this is that many would consider me to be a feminist because I believe that women should have equal rights to men, yet my wife considers herself to be a feminist, however we don't agree on everything on that topic, yet a lot of what we talk about on that topic has been from other feminist sources.

I looked for news articles critical of Anita Sarkeesian (I think at the time I was looking for information that might suggest that the threats against her were fake). I found this one:

http://gamesided.com/2014/09/08/sarkeesian-truth-part-1-straw-feminist-trojan-horse-censorship/2/

I don't know enough to form an opinion about the content in this article, but hopefully it'll point out to people here that feminists don't all have the same opinions so trying to claim that feminism "poisons everything" is like saying Christianity "poisons everything"*. If the gamesided.com article is correct in its analysis of some feminists' opinions, I would strongly disagree with those people, as I'm sure that many feminists would (which that article also points out). Furthermore, he then states that the woman at the start of his video "spits poison at the entire male Atheist community", apparently oblivious of his hypocritical "spitting poison at the entire feminist community.

I've watched about half an hours' worth of Anita Sarkeesian's videos. I don't keep up with her content, so unless I hear of something particularly unusual/new she's got to say, I probably won't be watching any more of it, but IMO she does a much better job of putting her points in a reasonably logical manner than thunderf00t does, and I agree with a heck of a lot of what she's got to say than I do thunderf00t's.

* - I am quite critical of Christianity for a number of reasons, however I think it would be extremely ignorant to claim that it "poisons everything".