Women as Background Decoration: Part 1 - Tropes vs Women in Video Games - General

[QUOTE=Larikang;45148337]Is it? What good would it do to have a few thoughtful comments among the inevitable torrents of hateful, ignorant, insulting vitriol?[/QUOTE] Well... The few thoughtful comments, for one thing.

[QUOTE=Larikang;45148337]Is it? What good would it do to have a few thoughtful comments among the inevitable torrents of hateful, ignorant, insulting vitriol?[/QUOTE] The fact that she's not going out of her way to stifle opposing viewpoints, no matter how hateful and ignorant they may be.

argh why did I even bother watching anymore... [QUOTE]Some games explicitly incentivise and reward this kind of behavior by having murdered women drop bundles of cash for the player to collect and add to their own stash. Clip: Grand Theft Auto IV “Is this what you had in mind? You don’t wanna make me finish you off!”[/QUOTE] Are you kidding??, Like every single person in the damn game drops money when they're killed, this has to be one of the worst examples I've ever seen.

[QUOTE=isnipeu;45154452] Are you kidding??, Like every single person in the damn game drops money when they're killed, this has to be one of the worst examples I've ever seen.[/QUOTE] It's actually one of the more valid ones in that video. Prostitutes do drop relatively large sums, encouraging their death.

[QUOTE=itisjuly;45154464]It's actually one of the more valid ones in that video. Prostitutes do drop relatively large sums, encouraging their death.[/QUOTE] For one prostitutes would obviously have more money on them than regular people, and second the example doesn't even specifies it to prostitutes, it just says women (and other women in the game drop the same amount of cash as other person would).

I said more valid, not 100% valid, relax man.

[QUOTE=itisjuly;45154641]I said more valid, not 100% valid, relax man.[/QUOTE] Why you are telling me to relax? I wasn't hostile/rude in my reply.

[QUOTE=itisjuly;45154464]It's actually one of the more valid ones in that video. Prostitutes do drop relatively large sums, encouraging their death.[/QUOTE] So do people that have just used ATMs though.

[QUOTE=bdd458;45149470]The fact that she's not going out of her way to stifle opposing viewpoints, no matter how hateful and ignorant they may be.[/QUOTE] It isn't exactly "stifling" opposing viewpoints if you can go anywhere else on the net and start a discussion about her videos there. Why is it so important that she enable comments on her videos? Do you think that Sarkeesian isn't aware of the mobs of the angry men who hate her on the internet? Do you think that you could convince her of how wrong she is if only you could leave her a Youtube comment? If you want to voice your opinion to her, why not send a message to her [URL="https://www.youtube.com/user/feministfrequency/about"]YouTube channel[/URL]? Or even comment on the videos on her [URL="https://www.facebook.com/femfreq"]Facebook page[/URL]? Or contact her on her [URL="http://www.feministfrequency.com/contact/"]website[/URL]? There are plenty of valid complaints about Feminist Frequency, but whining about how she disables YouTube comments - of all things - is just silly.

I'd actually argue that the GTA series is probably the only one of her contemporary examples that she actually gets right. Prostitutes that are exclusively female are allowed to be solicited for some kind of statistical benefit and then are programmed to drop the same amount of cash (more, in GTA V and I think IV?) that you paid for the "service". It pretty much fits the idea of a sexual object only their for it's utility and who's disposal is directly and purposefully encouraged by game mechanics. Obviously I don't want to see it removed but as a trope it's hard to argue against so I'd give her that one.

I find her videos entertaining to watch but it makes me literally cringe when she says shit like: "Players are often permitted to knock out, pick up, carry and throw around inert female bodies. And depending on the game series, the programmed options for interaction can include assault, mutilation, murder and everything in between." While saying this, she shows footage from Fallout: New Vegas and Dishonored, both games in which you can knock out, pick up, carry , throw around, assault, mutilate and murder both men and women alike. What was the point of that argument? Should the bodies of men the only ones to be allowed to be knocked out, picked up, carried and thrown around? That's not very egalitarian.

I've always considered Saints Row 3 and 4 to ironically be one of the least sexist/racist/etc. games out there. Let's look at Saints Row 3 and do a lieutenant headcount. You have the men, Johnny Gat, an Asian, Pierce Washington and Zimos, African Americans, Oleg, a Russian, and Angel, Hispanic. Now let's look at the Women. Shaundi is back, and we have Kinzie and Viola. In Saints Row 4 this is turned taken even farther as all characters are portrayed as being bisexual. Saints Row 4 also adds Asha Odekar who is portrayed as being the best black ops soldier in the world. This is a very diverse cast and each one of these characters is portrayed as being savvy, tough, and among the most powerful and influential people who have ever lived. This is, of course, discounting the boss, who can be literally whoever and whatever they want to be, but I decided to leave that out because that's kinda cheating, isn't it. [editline]19th June 2014[/editline] Also I'm pretty amused that she used New Vegas as an example seeing as a third of the prostitutes are men, a third are ghouls, and a third are woman. For other games sure but why would you use New Vegas like a moron and invalidate your own point?

Yeah, as usual she misses the forest for the trees and finds things without any mind to their context. There may be exclusively female prostitutes that have gameplay mechanics, but nearly every NPC in GTA is a vendor for some bullshit and the roadkill trophy isn't even exclusive to prostitutes when in San Andreas Drug Dealers dropped tons of cash and were prime targets. You might be able to find a pattern or some trope, but that pattern itself doesn't have power and when everything surrounding it undermine any kind of direction that pattern would have, you can hardly even find value in it. Things like violence against women when violence against men is significantly more prominent, treating women as objects when nearly every NPC regardless of gender is an object, and complaining about personal attributes women have when no man is perfect either, they all undermine any point she would make because she pays no mind to the context. There is just a lot wrong with the structure of the series being focused on tropes and in the way she doesn't do a full analysis preferring a more basic and shallow mention of them. It also seems very narrative focused where rather than a more common interpretation, she picks up on the extreme sexist narrative that only her and a deranged psychopath would find, because who else uses GTA exclusively as a prostitute murdering sim?

After watching this whole thing through I have to admit that while before while Sarkeesian was just an interesting activist with her videos. Now this argument reminds me of the old lobbyists saying how videogames make people violent and should be banned. I was willing to be like "Okay I see where your coming from" but then when she started arguing about how games start forcing you to single out women (Hitman, New Vegas, Human Revolution, Etc.,) I stopped giving her credit. She's conveniently ignoring too much in her arguments. Like she used Hitman as her example when she was talking about how women in games have become objects ignoring the fact that there are no gameplay reasons to attacking those women the player was attacking and that there are actually ramifications for doing so, and not just in the sense of giving the player a rush; you are considered a worse player by the game for murdering innocents like that. She's trying to argue that the player is encouraged to act like misogynistic assholes by playing these games and she uses an example of a game that punishes you for being a misogynistic asshole. Also she explains how male hookers are often played for laughs. Well, now you're just body shaming. Especially in the New Vegas example where it actually makes sense for there to be ghoul prostitutes and the Saints Row example where the scenario is funny simply because of the absurdity of having a pony cart chase where the "car" can catch fire and explode and not necessarily because the prostitutes happened to be male. She's now about the same as Joe Lieberman. [editline]20th June 2014[/editline] The only real point that I agreed with is that yeah, a lot of games seem to have strip clubs and I never really thought about that before. Otherwise I'm honestly getting the impression that she doesn't know what the fuck she's talking about. There's just an overabundance of isntances where she presents an argument over footage of a game where the game itself actually dismantles the argument for her when taken in context. I really don't believe she actually played those games because if she did then she would understand the context and would probably choose more fitting footage that would actually support her argument instead of actively contradicting it. Maybe if she was a gamer her points would have validity but as it stands I honestly believe that she's not and they don't. This comes off like a soccer mom saying "Yeah I heard that that there Human Revolution videogame lets you kill hookers so it should be banned," without making an attempt to actually look further into the game. [editline]20th June 2014[/editline] I kinda want to make a snarky mod for Skyrim now that marks all women as essential (including enemy females like standard bandits,) and release it with a note reading "Hey Anita, I agree that you shouldn't be able to assault or murder female NPCs because it objectifies women so much so this mod fixes Skyrim." But now I'm just being a completly childish asshole. :v:

ITT: SJW I just wanna play my video games, guys.

The first half of the video was decent. Showing the prevalence of female only brothels in games and the trope of the overly sexual, shallow woman in video games, but when she started to talk about the violent aspects of games as if they were only committed on women in these games, it covered up the additional context of unisex death. Most of the games where women were being stabbed, hit on the head etc have the same killing mechanic for male NPCs too. After that, the video did correctly identify the increased incentives for abuse of women, such as the health bonuses for using a prostitute and achievement in RDD for killing a woman with a train. The argument at the end though was utter shite, saying that violence in video games can make people without pre-existing conditions violent. And then using the fallacy of "if you disagree, it only makes it more right" as if it is proper evidence.

[QUOTE=LEETNOOB;45164439]ITT: SJW I just wanna play my video games, guys.[/QUOTE] I just want my slave to make me a sandwich.

Remember when she used footage of letsplayers instead of actually playing the games by herself? Without permission?

[QUOTE=LEETNOOB;45164439]ITT: SJW I just wanna play my video games, guys.[/QUOTE] Actually this is probably the most constructive thread about Sarkeesian I have seen so far, with a general consensus forming around the idea that the first half of the video makes sense in some examples but falls apart later on when she starts talking about games that don't fit the trope at all. You're post meanwhile doesn't really add anything to the conversation, but I will give you credit in not just boxing every post you disagree with without offering a counter-argument.

[QUOTE=Impact1986;45165018]Remember when she used footage of letsplayers instead of actually playing the games by herself? Without permission?[/QUOTE] Ever heard of fair use? You can use short clips as long as credit is given. Though TBH, I never really watched her videos fully, so I have no idea how much she actually used. Her videos are way too damn long, she needs to learn to cut to the chase.

[QUOTE=thelurker1234;45170164]Ever heard of fair use? You can use short clips as long as credit is given. Though TBH, I never really watched her videos fully, so I have no idea how much she actually used. Her videos are way too damn long, she needs to learn to cut to the chase.[/QUOTE] I don't believe that she ever gave credit.

[QUOTE=thelurker1234;45170164]Ever heard of fair use? You can use short clips as long as credit is given. Though TBH, I never really watched her videos fully, so I have no idea how much she actually used. Her videos are way too damn long, she needs to learn to cut to the chase.[/QUOTE] It's a two fold issue. It shows that she didn't put the effort in to record (or maybe even play) the games she was talking about, and she didn't credit the original video creators.

I have a sudden urge to make a copyright infrigment for her videos :v: