The Big Picture: With Great Power

[Machine Man 1992]

Those "homophobic, sexist, trolls" you rail against are just that-- trolls. They aren't going away, ever, no matter how much mainstreaming is done.

So man the fuck up and deal with it.

And what do you care anyway? You, by your own admission, don't play games online, outsider.

He didn't say trolls, you did. Unless you're quoting someone else in this thread and forgot to actually quote them.

No, we shouldn't have to deal with that crap, and there are ways to disown the trolls, to let them know they're not welcome in the community, to refuse to play with them, to ban them from forums, they'll still exist, but they won't be among us if we just put a little freaking effort in to calling them out.

Oh, and nice job being open-minded there about people that don't play games online, wanker...

I'm used to posting on TVtropes. If I could, "outsider" would have been a link to "Joking Mode" but whatev's.

You do realize the only way to make trolls go away is to just ignore them right? It's kind of ironic that your solution to discrimination is MORE discrimination, when a FUCKING MUTE BUTTON EXISTS.

Honestly, am I the only one who knows that there is a way to silence players you don't like? Am I the only one who looks in the goddamned options menu, and checks to see what my voice chat settings are?

Why has it gotten to the point where individual initiative has taken a back seat to molly coddling thin-skinned whiners, who can't handle the fact that people say mean things on the internet?

Given the tone of the rest of your commentary, the notion that you were joking about the "outsider" thing was in no way readily apparent.

And ignoring a problem doesn't make it go away, it just hides from it while the problem continues to fester.

Yeah, we all know about the mute button and use it, but that hasn't done anything to stop people spewing that hatred, hasn't stopped them from putting off people playing for the first time who don't yet know that apparently the only way to enjoy a game online is to mute people left, right and center, and it doesn't stop people spewing hatred in text chat or forums, your solution is only a bandaid for one manifestation of the problem.

And again, it is totally okay to discriminate against people who by their ACTIONS have proven themselves hateful, petty, infantile or otherwise not good company, if a kid goes around punching other kids in daycare then they get sent to time out, we don't tell the parents that they'll just have to provide their kids body armour or hand-to-hand combat training.

We shouldn't have to put up with such shit is the thing, it is not being thin-skinned to point at a relentlessly racist, sexist, homophobic person and say "you're a douchenozzle, GTFO." We don't put up with such shit in our real life social circles or in real world sports, so again, why should we put up with it in videogames? Why should we prove we can endure or ignore it endlessly?

If a tree falls in a forest, and nobody is around to hear it, does it make a sound?

If a troll is saying hurtful things, but nobody can hear them, do they really matter?

 

[Grampy_bone]

MovieBob used the term "cisgendered" his argument is invalid.

There is a pattern which has been repeating itself for the least few decades:

1. Woman infiltrates male-built, male-owned, male-operated, male-paid for space.
Her initial presence is welcomed by the men because men like having women around.

Girl: "Hey guys, can I play? I am a girl! Tee hee!"
Guys: "Sure okay."

2. Woman attempts to acquire "Manly Pride."
She usually does this by acting like an obnoxious douchebag, with extra "girl power" and "moxie." Men take this as a sign the girl is asking to be treated like an equal, rather than as a superior, which is how women usually want to be treated.

Girl: "I'm going to kick all your asses! Hope you like getting beat, losers!"
Guys: "Bring it."

3. Moxie is insufficient to overcome decades of male skill

Guys: "That's 397 matches to 2..."
Girl: *cries*

4. All pretense of egalitarianism are abandoned and pleas of special treatment are issued

Girl: "I'm just a girl! How can you be so meeeeaaaan???!?!?"

At this point the men have a choice. They can revert back to default female pandering behavior, or they can stick to their guns and eject the toxic attention whoring harpy in their midsts. This inevitable leads to:

5. Female marking of territory
Male shaming begins. Any and all complaints of female behavior, no matter how valid, become labeled as misogyny or hate speech. Discussions are shut down rather than encouraged. Harassment policies or even laws are created. Censorship and banning begins, cloaked by words like "inclusive" and "tolerance." Anything designed to appeal to men is erased, destroyed, banned, attacked, or ridiculed. Men who resist are called out as bitter virgins who can't get laid.

Eventually it gets so bad that:

6. Men abandon the space to female control
The chickification of anything it its death knell. Men leave it behind in favor of another different or new male-oriented activity. Don't believe me? Here's a little truth for ya: http://www.amazon.com/The-Tinder-Box-Politically-Destroyed/dp/098277348X

When women invade a job it declines, when women invade a hobby it becomes lame. When women invade things like the military, they get killed. http://www.clevescene.com/cleveland/fallen-angel/Content?oid=2301531

 

[Broderick]

The whole "geek girls" thing was mostly just a rant on my part, as many people seem to think they are a threat. It annoys me, so sorry if it seemed I attributed that mindset to you or others.

The whole fake g4m3r gurl thing is mainly to do with attention whoring.
Attention whores can be male or female. A lot of people myself included don't like attention whores.

Girls who play games = no problem whatsoever.
Twitch TV attention whores with cleavage on display in order to get guys to donate to support their awful WoW streams = I dislike them. Not saying they can't do it.

There's a lot of hypocrisy with people who defend them. They are the same people who want to ban booth babes, sexy characters and want more plus-size protagonists.

Indeed. Attention whoring is definitely annoying, but unfortunately inevitable in any social circle. I have no problem with people like the ones you mentioned doing twitch streams. Is it a bit annoying that might be making money just by being "sexy" on cam? Maybe, but that is their chosen way to make money and have fun, and I figure it isn't any of my business to challenge that.

As for booth babes and what not, many of the dissenters seem to forget that booth babes were hired to do what they do; that it was their choice. Characters with more varied body types would be nice, but it isn't really a deal breaker with me. I think it would be interesting playing a larger guy in say...a zombie apocalypse game, and build all sorts of mechanics around it. Like the guy couldn't run as fast or as long as his other fellow survivors, so you have to find other ways to approach a situation. Although something like that might be considered offensive so...perhaps not the best idea heh.

 

[Broderick]

The whole "geek girls" thing was mostly just a rant on my part, as many people seem to think they are a threat. It annoys me, so sorry if it seemed I attributed that mindset to you or others.

Oh, no offense taken.

As I said, you can make the case for a "no true Scotsman" setup, I just see the other side of the equation (because that's, well, my subculture). Namely, for someone who has self-declared themselves an expert in studying subcultures to flagrantly not understand the subculture they 'studied', and impose the values of their own subculture in place of that understanding. The joke is not that the space marine is female; it is that the backstory is 'most tragic'.

Hell, I challenge Movie Bob's understanding (and membership) in geek subculture if he's going to use "Revenge of the Nerds" as a motif for tolerance. Kinda hard (in my opinion) to accept as inspiration a film who's primary male protagonist rapes the primary female antagonist. But that's just me.

Heh yeah, I certainly agree with you there. Bob tends to make statements and then contradict them later. An example of this is his video "build a better gamer", he later contradicts his viewpoint in a couple of his moviebob videos, calling people who liked the transformers series and expendables some unruly names. Kinda kills the point of his "build a better gamer" methinks.

 

[Strazdas]

wow this ended up longer than i expected.

Indeed, it is true that quite a few of us do shun those unruly folks, however I think it needs to be done on a larger scale. I do not think it is people who are in the geek crowd "trying to be cool" that are the problem, I think it is people with anger issues, just plain assholes, and the kids on places like Xbox live that are being taught that that kind of behavior is an okay reaction. I think education would help enlighten some of these individuals, however, many of them may be too far gone to take advice, especially from a stranger.

I think this "Fake" vs "real" gamer sets up a no true Scotsman fallacy. Gamers and geeks, like all people, come from many different backgrounds. Some geeks will be assholes, while others will be nice. Some will be deceptive, while others not. People are people, and regardless of the background of these people, there will always be different kinds in all "cliques"; there will be asshole jocks, and nice ones, asshole geeks, nice ones. Maybe some are just having a bad day and you caught them at the wrong time, perhaps they are just venting the only way they know how. People are not so cut and dry as some would like to think. I would like to think that just shunning would work as suggested in my previous post, but that only band aids the problem. There needs to be a fundamental change in these people for the "wound" to fully heal. Perhaps many of the problems cannot be solves by strangers, but I think reaching out and trying to help is the first step.

But we shun it on massive scale. acting like that will get you banned on escapist very fast (heck, i got a 3 day gag for saying "your trolling". apparently that was insult worth of banning). same for even such places like Eggsbox live which DOES ban you for acting like a douche. its that most people dont report it but instead chose to cry and ***** about it. pretty much all nerds already hate these people and want nothing to do with them. to saying we should shun them is like saying water should be wet.
I can see why some people would attemt to put a no true scotsman on nerds, but when you see people claiming to be massive nerds of a franchines they havent played a single game (heck, they odnt know the main characters name) it really is no true nerd here. The misconception comes from people not knowing what nerd really is, which is why i posted the video in my original reply.
yes, there will be nice and bad people in all groups, but when you take a group that mostly acts like the "bad people" and try to stick a label on them on if a gruop that is normally known as different than those, theres bound to be some clashes between the two. I think most people who claim "look im an exception of a cliche" is not really so much of an exception but a mislabel. they would be the cliche in other gruop, but they intentionalyl or not mistake which group they belong to.
i think the most damage done here is that this kind of behaviuos is expected from the outsiders. when they expect you to act like an asshole it is much easier to do so.

 

[xaszatm]

Shameful post

You seriously believe that? You seriously believe that there is the "feminist" conspiracy? Do you mind showing me proof? And not just one or two articles, like actual proof? Or does the "feminist conspiracy" got that covered too? I...I actually cannot believe that someone would think like this. What happened to you in life where you would get this bull? The conservative right isn't as insane as this...

 

[oooooooooooooooooooooooooo]

She initiated the conflict then elevated the situation to make money. That's entirely different than somehow the gamer community reacted to a Kickstarter. It's her creating a row to have people donate to her and it's her manipulating people for money.

You can't keep arguing from that basis until you give me a good reason to believe it. I have yet to see any evidence at all that she is in this for the money.

No, it's entirely about her and her actions. And that's what reprehensible. She got money for a cause that is misguided and shows off her ignorance of storytelling and very little, if any, qualitative or quantitative data that proves that there's sexism in games.

There is sexism in videogames, that's as blatantly obvious as things get. Whether she effectively demonstrates that is a discussion for another thread, but if she doesn't and if your perception of her lacking in storytelling or what have you is correct, that doesn't make her somehow immoral or deserving of those threats.

When your actions cause the conflict that creates the reaction. It's like Newtons Second Law of Physics. "For every action, there is an equal but opposite reaction."

Yes, but first of all were are not just a bunch of simple physical entities, we are people who can choose how we react, and as I said previously reacting by threatening rape is unacceptable, especially because it was not even vaguely an 'equal but opposite reaction'. I don't remember her making personal threats of any kind, never mind of rape and murder, even just the a stupid sexist comment. Hell, even aside from the threats, the huge amount sexist comments she got in response was unacceptable.

And yet... I haven't seen this coordinated attack, nor have I seen anything other than a few negative criticisms. What are you trying to hide when the comments show that VERY FEW people were overly negative? And why are you hiding behind the most extreme examples when most of the examples just said "This doesn't really need to be done?" I never get that... It's like people getting low comment posts on Escapist. It happens. So do crazy posts calling people bad names. You deal with it and move on. She just got money from it.

Again, nothing about a coordinated attack was ever claimed. But we did a video game were the point was beat her up. And alright, lets ignore the threats and 'extreme examples', even aside from those, she gets hundreds of stupidly sexist 'get back in the kitchen' or such comments on each of her videos, and those I can definitely link you to. Again, whatever her point or stance is, a sexist reaction like that is never justified.

And when has Anita engaged critic or supporter alike? She's hiding behind her ivory tower while ignoring criticism and comments and a bad argument.

I honestly don't know how she interacts with the community, but when a good chunk of the reaction is essentially 'fuck you for being a woman with an opinion' I can definitely understand why she'd be less than keen to get involved.

As I stated above... I looked at her screenshots. The comments weren't filled with rape and death threats and she selectively edited them to show the worst while ignoring the rest. That's someone willing to lie to you and prepackage hurtful comments to boost her argument. You really want to believe someone like that?

No, the youtube comments weren't. The were filled with comments like 'the bigger the hoops, the bigger the whore' and 'you need a good dicking'. And of course she ignored the rest, her point was demonstrating that there are lots of people like this. And because it seems everyone feels they can criticize her without actually bothering to watch her videos, she goes out of her way in one of the Damsel in Distress videos to point out that these are certainly not the only gamers around.

Funny... Last I checked, the "gaming culture" is pretty inclusive and we've seen domestic violence go down as game consumption go up. So saying that the culture treats people pretty awfully really needs to be quantified before you can use that against me.

And that's I say you're missing my point, because that's what I've been repeatedly explaining over my last few posts. The culture has gotten to the point where it's happy to throw death and rape threats and homophobic slander around as a mainstay. It's gotten to the point where someone having an entirely unproven theory about her being after money and absolutely nothing else, despite the fact that she keeps pushing a feminist agenda and did so before the kickstarter, somehow makes a huge sexist reaction justified. That's why this isn't about Sarkeesian. Even if she is very the worst you claim she is, the community's knee-jerk reaction of sexist attacks is far worse.

Here are the comments I am referring to: http://www.feministfrequency.com/2012/06/harassment-misogyny-and-silencing-on-youtube/#more-2348

 

[infinity_turtles]

The culture has gotten to the point where it's happy to throw death and rape threats and homophobic slander around as a mainstay.

Not who you're talking to, but I think this right here is really my primary problem with the the stance a lot of people are taking. The trolling/chan sub-culture is not the same as geek or gaming culture. The fact that a lot of gamers are trying so damn hard to force others to claim it as part of gaming culture is so damn absurd to me. It'd be like some Christians trying to force all other Christians to claim the Westboro Baptist Church as one of their own and take responsibility for them. It's like trying to invite in cancer.

The fact is, the ease of setting up your own little niche where anything goes on the internet means trolling is gonna be a thing. Those who want to will, and there's not a damn thing you can do to stop it outside of actually introducing legislation(and even that won't stop anything given the global nature of the internet). Best you can do is not feed the trolls and not take them seriously, because big reactions are fun for them to watch.

 

[Gindil]

She initiated the conflict then elevated the situation to make money. That's entirely different than somehow the gamer community reacted to a Kickstarter. It's her creating a row to have people donate to her and it's her manipulating people for money.

You can't keep arguing from that basis until you give me a good reason to believe it. I have yet to see any evidence at all that she is in this for the money.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OExCdOImmVA

About 11 minutes in, it's shown. I can't find the archives on 4chan due to their very nature, but someone spammed her channel as soon as her kickstarter was announced. Further proof includes the escapist pages at the time of discussion where it was known that someone spammed the kickstarter on /v/ right as the kickstarter launched. So it was spammed to her, she riled up the trolls, then plays innocent when the trolls fire back mean and hateful things while the gamer community gets blamed.

No, it's entirely about her and her actions. And that's what reprehensible. She got money for a cause that is misguided and shows off her ignorance of storytelling and very little, if any, qualitative or quantitative data that proves that there's sexism in games.

There is sexism in videogames, that's as blatantly obvious as things get. Whether she effectively demonstrates that is a discussion for another thread, but if she doesn't and if your perception of her lacking in storytelling or what have you is correct, that doesn't make her somehow immoral or deserving of those threats.

Uhm... No? Where is the "blatant discrimination of gender" that you seem to think is surrounding the entire world?

And I'm calling those threats "troll shots". You know... She got trolled massively, kept feeding them for money, then reaped the benefit of prepackaging the media her sob story. It sure worked instead of people doing investigative journalism and finding out why people talk about /v/ on her "misogyny" page...

When your actions cause the conflict that creates the reaction. It's like Newtons Second Law of Physics. "For every action, there is an equal but opposite reaction."

Yes, but first of all were are not just a bunch of simple physical entities, we are people who can choose how we react, and as I said previously reacting by threatening rape is unacceptable, especially because it was not even vaguely an 'equal but opposite reaction'. I don't remember her making personal threats of any kind, never mind of rape and murder, even just the a stupid sexist comment. Hell, even aside from the threats, the huge amount sexist comments she got in response was unacceptable.

That's what trolling is. It's custom fitted talking points to initiate conflict. If she was black, there's be talks about how she's a slave. If she were male, they'd be calling her gay and talking about anal rape. It's meaningless words based on physical characteristics which she manipulated to make money. And it worked.

Further, she antagonized this situation to make money. That's why it's dishonest. It worked out for her, but now the entire press complex misquotes the gaming community (that had nothing to do with this) with the 4chan community she trolled. Also, we now have a gender war that shouldn't have been fought for the past year. This isn't progressive. It's regressive.

And again, show me those comments. I've just explained that most were criticisms. Are you now dismissing ALL criticisms as sexist hate speech?

And yet... I haven't seen this coordinated attack, nor have I seen anything other than a few negative criticisms. What are you trying to hide when the comments show that VERY FEW people were overly negative? And why are you hiding behind the most extreme examples when most of the examples just said "This doesn't really need to be done?" I never get that... It's like people getting low comment posts on Escapist. It happens. So do crazy posts calling people bad names. You deal with it and move on. She just got money from it.

Again, nothing about a coordinated attack was ever claimed. But we did a video game were the point was beat her up. And alright, lets ignore the threats and 'extreme examples', even aside from those, she gets hundreds of stupidly sexist 'get back in the kitchen' or such comments on each of her videos, and those I can definitely link you to. Again, whatever her point or stance is, a sexist reaction like that is never justified.

Bullshit. Anita claimed that this was a coordinated attack on CNN. And the video game was free speech which people misquoted. Also, she has disabled comments but still doesn't want a conversation about these. So again... Show me how most of the comments are sexist besides what she selectively edits.

And when has Anita engaged critic or supporter alike? She's hiding behind her ivory tower while ignoring criticism and comments and a bad argument.

I honestly don't know how she interacts with the community, but when a good chunk of the reaction is essentially 'fuck you for being a woman with an opinion' I can definitely understand why she'd be less than keen to get involved.

*sigh*

No, it's not because she's a woman. It's because her views are toxic. Do you see Felicia Day, Lisa Foiles, or Brenda Romero treated in the same manner? If you're sexist yourself, expect the same in return. "Do unto others as you would have done unto yourself". Anita is not a paragon of virtue, nor should we claim that she is when her own views are lazy and ignorant of how storytelling works in entertainment.

As I stated above... I looked at her screenshots. The comments weren't filled with rape and death threats and she selectively edited them to show the worst while ignoring the rest. That's someone willing to lie to you and prepackage hurtful comments to boost her argument. You really want to believe someone like that?

No, the youtube comments weren't. The were filled with comments like 'the bigger the hoops, the bigger the whore' and 'you need a good dicking'. And of course she ignored the rest, her point was demonstrating that there are lots of people like this. And because it seems everyone feels they can criticize her without actually bothering to watch her videos, she goes out of her way in one of the Damsel in Distress videos to point out that these are certainly not the only gamers around.

Not buying it until there's proof of how many comments were positive versus negative. Anita has a history of lying and quite frankly, if she can tell you, a supporter, that most of the comments were negative and have you believe it, then more power to you. I won't listen to someone with a history of lying and manipulation to achieve their own means.

And again, if I were to discuss the entire problem with her premise, she won't engage the critics. She never does. Good arguments encourage criticism. Bad arguments hide from it. And hers is pretty bad.

Funny... Last I checked, the "gaming culture" is pretty inclusive and we've seen domestic violence go down as game consumption go up. So saying that the culture treats people pretty awfully really needs to be quantified before you can use that against me.

And that's I say you're missing my point, because that's what I've been repeatedly explaining over my last few posts. The culture has gotten to the point where it's happy to throw death and rape threats and homophobic slander around as a mainstay. It's gotten to the point where someone having an entirely unproven theory about her being after money and absolutely nothing else, despite the fact that she keeps pushing a feminist agenda and did so before the kickstarter, somehow makes a huge sexist reaction justified. That's why this isn't about Sarkeesian. Even if she is very the worst you claim she is, the community's knee-jerk reaction of sexist attacks is far worse.

Here are the comments I am referring to: http://www.feministfrequency.com/2012/06/harassment-misogyny-and-silencing-on-youtube/#more-2348

Yeah, and I checked the Youtube page. I even looked at Metroidman90's YT page. He has one song and he commented to other videos. Some are decent comments. So again... No misogyny there. Maybe some trolling and as the CNN lady said Anita shouldn't feed the trolls.

Also... Yet again... Stop confusing gaming culture with 4chan culture. The two are not synonymous. It's like saying all of Anonymous is just the same. A bunch of trolls that like to get lulz. It's not. If you have an ignorance of the communities created by internet access, I can understand. But ranting and raving that the gaming culture has gotten bad when you want to condemn the actions of gamers that had nothing to do with 4chan vs Anita is just ridiculous.

 

[ArithianFlame]

I thought the episode started off well. I enjoyed the history and comparison bit. It pointed out some examples in the culture that are now blindingly obvious, such as technology in relation to sports.

I could have done without the moral message though. Do I agree that geeks can be racist, contradictory, bigots? Of course. It doesn't take much more than a peek at my avatar remind us that there is still plenty of hate in geekdom. Hatred and intolerance are an inherent facet of humanity. But no more or less than in any other group of culture.

 

[Tribalism]

Bob, I usually enjoy your Big Picture videos. They offer unique insight into a part of geek culture that you can't find so easily on the internet. I didn't enjoy this episode, however. It's not that you took a serious stance on a serious issue which made me dislike it, since I enjoyed your PETA episode amongst others in the same vein. It's the fact that you hopped on this particular subject, a subject which is the focal point of plenty of online discussion at the moment. Furthermore, you didn't bring any hard facts to the table. Your 6 minute extract could be summarised as "It's my opinion that we should be more accepting of X and you should feel the same because you're a geek too!".

I get it, that's a strawman argument, but it's what I pulled out of your video. The point is that you didn't bring anything worth discussing. There were no statistics, unlike in your video on PETA where you brought up the statistic of animals euthanised by PETA, for example.

That's not to say I'm against most of the "rights" movements out there, just that I don't agree with their methods. Any minority that is under-represented in video games often wish to be better represented. Women want more "female leads" in video games, but complain when they demonstrate qualities viewed as "masculine". They complain that the women are "unnaturally beautiful" when 90% of male gamers aren't as attractive as Nathan Drake, strong as Marcus Fenix, charismatic as Duke Nukem, as heroic as a fat Italian plumber etc.

The LGBT movement can complain they're under-represented, but what does it really change if a character is gay, bi, lesbian or transgendered? A character isn't solely defined by their sexual orientation or gender and any character that IS would be very poorly written. Same thing with race, unless the game is some sort of Django Unchained story where race gives motivation for actions.

Again, I'm not against the rights movements in place. I'd be happy to accept most of the arguments if they held water. People want to be accepted for not being "cis-gendered"? Stop creating terms to alienate yourself. Want to identify as "female/male" before transitioning? Sure, but don't be surprised if people don't immediately get your pronouns right. Annoyed because someone got your pronoun wrong? Grow up, most kids have called their teacher "mum/dad" once by mistake, it happens and in the long run it makes no difference. As a female, want to be taken more seriously and seen as more than just a pair of tits and ass? Show you've got a working brain and prove people wrong, any male with a muscular physique has to do the same. Want a female role model in gaming? There's a whole bunch of them, choose one. Want to be considered more than just someone who's oppressed? Then stop acting like it. When your entire persona is that of a "X rights activist" and it's all you do, people will negatively judge you. Smiliarly:

Hit the gym 5+ days a week and build muscle like Arnold? People will think you're a meatheaded steroid abuser.
Play video games every day for several hours and barely interact with the outside world? People will think you're a basement dwelling virgin.
Complaining about your life and how hard it is and how you never get a break? You're that guy no one wants to be around because they're too negative.

 

[Jezzascmezza]

This could be MovieBob's audition for the upcoming remake of Chaplin's The Great Dictator.




(Which isn't happening at all, but I bet I just made some of you shit bricks).

 

[Deadagent]

She initiated the conflict then elevated the situation to make money. That's entirely different than somehow the gamer community reacted to a Kickstarter. It's her creating a row to have people donate to her and it's her manipulating people for money.

You can't keep arguing from that basis until you give me a good reason to believe it. I have yet to see any evidence at all that she is in this for the money.

There is no concrete proof for any of this mainly due to the nature of 4chan (they don't have archives of most stuff, some threads do get archived by third parties but most dont), and the thight control on Anitas own videos and website. However looking at her actions before the kickstarter and her other videos is enough to raise enough of a suspicion that she did all of this intentionally. For more detail: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8bLpUcd8-cI

 

[JimB]

MovieBob used the term "cisgendered;" his argument is invalid.

How and why does that render his argument invalid?

 

[Something Amyss]

We also have better points of view on the subjects that aren't total windbags, like Extra Credits did a great job addressing women in games without resorting to the nonsense Anita does. Shamefully though, they still get 1/10th of the attention she does, because she used the disasterous outcry against her as a venue of getting more attention.

It's funny you should mention the two. EC frequently abuses the "did not do the research" trope, and are quite shitty about making persuasive arguments. Oddly, people are not only fine with that, but praise them for their efforts. I've always found this hypocritical of people who criticise Anita Sarkeesian for the same things. EC is intellectually lazy and possibly intellectually dishonest, but that's okay because REASONS!

MovieBob used the term "cisgendered" his argument is invalid.

I, too object to accurate descriptions of people and things.

You seriously believe that? You seriously believe that there is the "feminist" conspiracy?

Like, OMG, they want to not be outright rejected and stuff. Can you believe it?

The oppressed becomes the oppressor, though me being black, I never had a problem with the culture being mostly white.

Couple of serious questions here:

Being black, can you honestly point to a time in American history where black people have been the oppressors?

More to the point in my opinion: I can't go on live without hearing the word "******" like 900 times. You're seriously okay with a culture that is okay with active displays of disdain by comparing them to black people (and black people in a derogatory sense, to boot)?

I mean, fair play if you are, but still. That seems quite dissonant to me.

The LGBT movement can complain they're under-represented, but what does it really change if a character is gay, bi, lesbian or transgendered?

I don't know. If nothing really changes, why do all those straight males throw a hissyfit when something other that a straight, white, male is the protagonist?

That's sort of the double standard of gaming. We're told it shouldn't matter if there's a lack of minority representation, and yet we have the incredibly overblown reactions of the majority at pretty much every turn. "ewwww, there's a girl on the front cover! I might get cooties!"

A character isn't solely defined by their sexual orientation or gender and any character that IS would be very poorly written. Same thing with race, unless the game is some sort of Django Unchained story where race gives motivation for actions.

And here we're somewhere between a false dichotomy and a strawman. There's more options than "not having lgbt people in the game" and "making it all about their sex/sexuality/identity." Nobody wants the latter. At least, nobody I've ever come across. They seem to be some strange bogeyman that exists only in minds of people trying to justify the majority stance.

Stop creating terms to alienate yourself.

You've got that backwards, sweetie.