Is Street Fighter Sexist/Racist?

[Olas]

Just because racism isn't hateful, that doesn't make it stop being racism, and I also don't prescribe to the kind of moral relativism that says we should tolerate racial stereotyping because the Japanese do.

Looks like you misunderstood.

Tolerating racial stereotyping because the Japanese do it, is because in their culture it's not perceived as racial stereotyping. You shouldn't judge a different culture by YOUR own culture's standards.

I didn't misunderstand, I know exactly what you're talking about, I just disagree that somehow the fact that the Japanese are more okay with something than us means it's more universally acceptable if they do it. What if the Japanese culture were more misogynistic than our culture, or took misogyny less seriously, would that mean we should turn a blind eye to it whenever there's misogyny in their media?
It seems ludicrous to believe that something could be immoral in one society, and moral in another. As if the concept of right and wrong has borders.

Japanese don't associate stereotyping with racism, and again, it should be easily demonstrated by the fact that they've stereotyped THEMSELVES as badly as the other cultures.
In fact, if SF wasn' a Japanese videogame, you'd say the game is very racist towards the Japanese.

You keep bringing this up as if it's supposed to excuse them or something. I'd say stereotyping your own people is bad in it's own right, even if most people feel comfortable doing it. You're still taking a group that's larger than you and simplifying them to a demeaning archetype that some of them might find offensive.
But even if one considers it okay to stereotype one's own race/culture, I still don't see how doing so gives one free reign to do the same to other cultures/races/nationalities.

I don't think I can do much more here, since there's some people who are so blind in their decision that they want to be outraged by SF, that all the reason of the world can't stop them.

I never said I was outraged. Trust me, if I was I'd be using very different language. I just find your justification for the game's content lacking and feel it should be challenged.

 

[makano]

I never got the controversy behind Resident Evil 5. Africa + Zombies = African Zombies. You shoot them because they're undead, not because they're black. The only offensive thing I can think of is the portrayal of the Ndipaya tribe, and you might argue they're taking the Indiana Jones route of caricature (never heard a peep about the portrayal of Peruvian tribesmen in Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, not even from my Peruvian buddies). There's a general concensus it's dumb and harmless.

After apartheid, the image of a white cop shooting Africans is a little troubling to some. I think understandably so.

So its ok to kill Spanish people in 4? Face it you are seeing racism where there is none, If Chris said after each kill "There i killed a n*****" i would agree that its racist. But now you are projecting crimes on to a character of fiction.
So by your logic i can have all the black rappers arrested for rapping about killing white cops. Think about what road you go down because you may not like the end result.

 

[Yuuki]

I wish everyone could just agree that EVERYTHING is sexist/racist. That way the Offended-Brigade would be happy (or at least content that everyone "agrees" with them) and we won't need any more of these kinds of discussions.

It's a win/win. Deep down we know that sexism/racism has basically turned into a bit of a running joke in recent years, so lets just roll with it.

 

[Weaver]

Contrary to what you say, Cammy is probably one of the more fleshed out side characters.

Street Fighter, and even other fighting games, rely on cartoonish exaggeration of tropes and stereotypes to convey what a character is "about" in about the 3 second intro bit a character does before and after a round. You can tell C-Viper is a special agent, you can tell Dhalsim is some kind of stretchy magic floating fire yoga man, you can tell Ryu is a stoic martial artist who is too serious about everything, you can tell Balrog is a boxer, etc.

It's a cheap and fast way to assign personality to a character without having to do much work and, to be honest, I'm not playing a fighting game to read 30 pages of backstory.

 

[DarthSka]

As many have said before, practically everyone in this series is a stereotypical representation of wherever they're from, so I wouldn't say it's something to really get so worked up about. Street Fighter and even Japanese culture in general seems to be pretty all encompassing when it comes to stereotypically representing cultures and race in their media, even their own. It's just not that big of a deal to them as it is in other countries like the USA.

Seems to me you willingly ignored all the sexualized male costumes in order to prove your point.

Having big muscles is good if you are a fighter.

Having big boobs is bad if you are a fighter.

Drawing idealized males is not to turn on women, it's a power fantasy for men.

Hey, whatever. If your idea of a power fantasy is a man in a thong or in a hawaiian skirt, that's ok.

I'm not going to argue this point anymore. You're bent on not seeing the obvious sexualization, and therefore you will never, ever see it.
Although I am pretty sure you would cry out sexism if those outfits (bikini, hawaiian skirt, ripped costume, underwear) were worn by female characters.

I don't think you can really please people with this type of mindset. You can put a man in any ridiculous outfit and expose as much skin as possible, but as long as he's physically fit, he can somehow ONLY be a male power fantasy. Lord knows women hate a guy who works out.

 

[C.S.Strowbridge]

In order to be called sexist/racist it has to be discriminatory and portray that sex/race in a negative manner. But Street Fighter is basically one giant pile of cartoonish stereotypes...none of whom are supposed to be taken seriously.

No. Cartoonish stereotypes can be sexist / racist. In fact, positive stereotypes can be sexist / racist.

Well then in that case you can call Street Fighter sexist / racist all day

Because it is racist. Just because you don't care doesn't mean it isn't racist. But clearly you do care, otherwise you wouldn't post in this thread. Nope, you do care if it is racist / sexist or not, but you are willing to defend racism / sexism.

 

[C.S.Strowbridge]

Seems to me you willingly ignored all the sexualized male costumes in order to prove your point.

Having big muscles is good if you are a fighter.

Having big boobs is bad if you are a fighter.

Drawing idealized males is not to turn on women, it's a power fantasy for men.

The male bodies (Aside from E Honda) depicted in Street fighter are *absolutely terrible* for fighting.

They take the ideal, big muscles, and exaggerate them, because it is a power fantasy. It isn't realistic, but it is a power fantasy. The fantasy is to be powerful enough to defeat your enemies.

On the other hand, too often they take the women and give them big boobs, which would actually make it harder to defeat their enemies. Or make them do stripper moves while fighting, which again would actually make it harder to defeat their enemies.

 

[Yuuki]

In order to be called sexist/racist it has to be discriminatory and portray that sex/race in a negative manner. But Street Fighter is basically one giant pile of cartoonish stereotypes...none of whom are supposed to be taken seriously.

No. Cartoonish stereotypes can be sexist / racist. In fact, positive stereotypes can be sexist / racist.

Well then in that case you can call Street Fighter sexist / racist all day

Because it is racist. Just because you don't care doesn't mean it isn't racist. But clearly you do care, otherwise you wouldn't post in this thread. Nope, you do care if it is racist / sexist or not, but you are willing to defend racism / sexism.

Nope, not willing to defend it. It's clearly very racist, I finally see that. Everything is sexist / racist depending on perspective, this is something I learned long ago on these forums.

 

[DaViller]

They take the ideal, big muscles, and exaggerate them, because it is a power fantasy. It isn't realistic, but it is a power fantasy. The fantasy is to be powerful enough to defeat your enemies.

On the other hand, too often they take the women and give them big boobs, which would actually make it harder to defeat their enemies. Or make them do stripper moves while fighting, which again would actually make it harder to defeat their enemies.

Street fighter in particular is actually pretty light on fanservice.

Looking around the fighting game landscape street fighter 4 is pretty tame in terms of outfits and bodytypes as far as female characters are concerned. Cammy wears pretty much the lightest outfit out of all the SF 4 characters and even that is pretty reasonable compared to some of the stuff seen en masse in mortal combat or soul calibur. The ass-shot poses are a bit unnessescary but cammys outfit doesn't bother me much. She doesn't have abnormally large boobs while being thin as a bone otherwise, shes got reasonable muscle for a character with her highly agile fighting style and none of her moves look llike stripper moves.

Same goes for pretty every female character in sf4, none of them have mai shiranui sized boobs or fighting poses designed to flash body parts (although i don't have any particular problems with these as well). Thats one of the things I particulary like about sf, the female characters look like they actually could kick my ass having some actual muscle instead of just some rather well situated fat. For that sort of stuff look towards doa, the women there have bodys that would only be usefull on a catwalk not a fight.

The female cast is also pretty diverse when it comes to visual design. You got sakura a school girl, ibuki a ninja, yuri the psycho *****, makoto who many dont even identify as female, cammy with her swimsuit and of course chun li with her body builder legs. The only character I would notice as a real fanservice character is poison who is not in the game yet... and has some other qualitys that kinda disqualify her(?) as far as I'm concerned.

The alleged racist characters on the other hand... I personally like those a lot even though that might sound horrible. I realy wouldn't want t.hawk, deejay, balrog and especially dhalsim (im half indian and dhalsim is pretty funny imo) to look any different.

 

[Frankster]

On the other hand, too often they take the women and give them big boobs, which would actually make it harder to defeat their enemies. Or make them do stripper moves while fighting, which again would actually make it harder to defeat their enemies.

Could you please elaborate on this? Honestly the street fighter women for the most part have tended to stand out in my eyes by the sheer thickness of their muscled legs rather then abnormally huge breast sizes. Does any female street fighter character really strike you as having an impossible breast size? Heck there's a few girls in my karate class with bigger breasts then cammy or chun-li and they don't seem to have too much trouble doing their stuff.
Same for stripper moves please, what exactly do you mean by that?

Otherwise street fighter is definitly rascist/stereotypical/sexist.
But I quite enjoy playing a fat sumo, a blond haired "typical" arrogant american, an indian yogi, a native indian or a bruce lee clone tyvm so am happy to give it a free pass, sometimes stereotypes are fun and in a fighting game it serves to give their character immediate personality.

 

[Something Amyss]

It's not fanart. It's official concept art for the costume that is available in the game:

And yet you couldn't post that in the first place. And went for a more convenient version.

And your reply here shows me you don't even know Street Fighter. So why are you even acting as if you can judge it?

I've played since the original up to IV. This ad hominem is another dismissal out of convenience. A shame you took that route instead of adressing actual topical ideas.

Tolerating racial stereotyping because the Japanese do it, is because in their culture it's not perceived as racial stereotyping.

So you're cool with pedophilia and beheadings if a culture says they're okay? What about female genital mutilation? Are you pro FGM because the countries that practice it are primarily cultures that are okay with it?

I don't think I can do much more here, since there's some people who are so blind in their decision that they want to be outraged by SF, that all the reason of the world can't stop them.

I think you misunderstand. Several people (myself included) have gone so far as to pretty much say "it's racist and sexist. So what?" In fact, you seem to be saying the opposite. "It doesn't bother me personally, (false appeal to authority), so NO SEXISM."

Instead of claiming no amount of reason will work, why not actually try using some reason. Instead of, you know, strawmanning anyone who takes issue with non-reasonable arguments.

 

[Something Amyss]

Because it is racist. Just because you don't care doesn't mean it isn't racist. But clearly you do care, otherwise you wouldn't post in this thread. Nope, you do care if it is racist / sexist or not, but you are willing to defend racism / sexism.

And it doesn't mean you can't like it, either. A lot of people seem to be in the boat that "yeah, it's sexist/racist, but I enjoy it." That's fine. Maybe not admirable, but fine. To borrow once more from Anita Sar...She who must not be named:

This series will include critical analysis of many beloved games and characters, but remember that it is both possible (and even necessary) to simultaneously enjoy media while also being critical of it?s more problematic or pernicious aspects.

Emphasis mine.

 

[Requia]

They take the ideal, big muscles, and exaggerate them, because it is a power fantasy. It isn't realistic, but it is a power fantasy. The fantasy is to be powerful enough to defeat your enemies.

On the other hand, too often they take the women and give them big boobs, which would actually make it harder to defeat their enemies. Or make them do stripper moves while fighting, which again would actually make it harder to defeat their enemies.

I wasn't talking about big muscles, check your reading comprehension. I'm talking about them being dehydrated to all get out, which y'know, makes it harder to win fights.

 

[Yuuki]

On the other hand, too often they take the women and give them big boobs, which would actually make it harder to defeat their enemies. Or make them do stripper moves while fighting, which again would actually make it harder to defeat their enemies.

Are we still talking about Street Fighter IV? The only one who could be considered even remotely huge is Rose, a sorceress type who fights with magic (so she's really not too hindered). The rest are...well...

But "stripper moves" hints that you could be talking about something else entirely because that's definitely not Street Fighter.

Still, SF is still totally racist / sexist / etc from some people's perspectives though. I'm OK with that.

 

[Olas]

Allow me to say you still didn't understand what I am talking about, and keep misunderstanding.

You keep saying I misunderstand as if you're doing it to annoy me or something.

- If Japanese culture was okay with racism, it wouldn't be more universally acceptable at all.

- If Japanese culture didn't perceive a certain thing as being racist or offensive, it would be ok for them to do it because they don't mean any discrimination with it.

Do you grasp the difference?

I guess I don't understand how the Japanese are allowed to dictate to the world what is or isn't stereotyping and what is or isn't offensive. The way I see it racial stereotyping is racial stereotyping regardless of what the person who's doing it thinks it is.

So, to continue with the sexism analogy, if I created a piece of media that suggested that women should stay in the household and cook, it wouldn't matter so long as MY culture didn't consider that to be sexism?

 

[BNguyen]

I never got the controversy behind Resident Evil 5. Africa + Zombies = African Zombies. You shoot them because they're undead, not because they're black. The only offensive thing I can think of is the portrayal of the Ndipaya tribe, and you might argue they're taking the Indiana Jones route of caricature (never heard a peep about the portrayal of Peruvian tribesmen in Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, not even from my Peruvian buddies). There's a general concensus it's dumb and harmless.

After apartheid, the image of a white cop shooting Africans is a little troubling to some. I think understandably so.

Africans can also be white - South Africa I'm sure has a sizeable white population. Also, your partner in the game is black, or at least half, and she's shooting the Africans right alongside you. I hardly see a case to be offended.

 

[Dendio]

As a black man, Capcom has done some stuff to piss me off.

Statements like these is where true racism starts. You are your own person. Speak only for yourself. Its all too easy for people to think ( o this guy must be speaking for all black people because he is a black man) and then start making assumptions on people based on race.

 

[marche45]

I'm kind of curious about this.

Where is the line between portraying characters with features from their race/religion/culture/country, and racism?

Also,how do you define racism?The dictionary definition where their is implied superiority and races should be treated differently?

 

[NeutralDrow]

As a black man, Capcom has done some stuff to piss me off.

Statements like these is where true racism starts. You are your own person. Speak only for yourself.

He was.

I can't even begin to interpret the rest of what you said.