The Big Picture: With Great Power

[runic knight]

Yes, I can certainly see how that can be frustrating, but like you say, it's coming from both sides. I've had two people in this thread so far just lump me in the Sarkeesian supporters because I have a problem with the response she received. I certainly think a fair amount of what she says is nonsense, though not everything and she is right in her overall point that there is a problem with sexism in gaming. I've also had one of them defend the attacks as not misogynistic because it's trolling as if that somehow exempts them from being discriminatory. Anyway, it's not her fault that most the community (and I'm sticking both sides of the argument in here) seems to be too stupid to look at anything in any way other than absolutely black and white. And to be fair, I'd rather have the discussion stuffed down people's throats than largely ignored on the sidelines, and she's certainly managed to bring about that change.

I think there's a fair argument for Trolls as a whole not actually being discriminatory though. They target those whom they believe they can get a reaction from, or those who they believe will get a reaction from others, and tailor their insults to be the most offensive. They're assholes, and that shouldn't be excused(though I will always recommend ignoring it), but their bullshit shouldn't be taken at face value. Misogyny is about hating women, trolling is about pissing people off for entertainment. There's a solid difference in intent, and by conflating the two it muddies the water when trying to talk about the realities of sexism on the internet. If Misogyny is caused by poor perception of women, then widespread trolling in ways that appear to be misogynistic is caused by knowledge that there's a widespread strong emotional investment in combating it. The cultural implications are widely different and damn near opposites.

There is a problem with this though, as you can have a spectrum of reasons behind why people are trolling. Some might just be assholes where as some might be misogynists and others might be a healthy mix of both. I do agree that as far as internet trolling itself goes, looking at the nature of why they do it is very important. And when it comes to calling something "sexist", it is outright essential. Problem is in how people define the terms though. If someone defines sexism by reaction, as is often the case from many feminist perspectives, then it doesn't matter the intent behind the person, only the result. If sexism is defined by intent though, then it is called far less often as one has to make an argument about intent. Ultimately, that is why I side with the later in the end myself. Sexism is a claim and by the very nature of making claims, one should have to support it and quite frankly any support stemming from personal feelings rather then demonstrability of the definition just doesn't mean shit. An individual is not representative of all members of their group, so one person's reaction towards something is not indicative of the feeling or stance of all of that group.
In the end, it is about intellectual integrity and laziness. You will get a mix of real misogynists among trolls who treat everyone equally regardless of gender or sex (albeit treat everyone poorly). Either one acknowledges that and shows the intellectual integrity to avoid sweeping claims about the whole of the group based off of some, or they show intellectual laziness and try to paint them all by whatever light they want.

 

[oooooooooooooooooooooooooo]

I think there's a fair argument for Trolls as a whole not actually being discriminatory though. They target those whom they believe they can get a reaction from, or those who they believe will get a reaction from others, and tailor their insults to be the most offensive. They're assholes, and that shouldn't be excused(though I will always recommend ignoring it), but their bullshit shouldn't be taken at face value. Misogyny is about hating women, trolling is about pissing people off for entertainment. There's a solid difference in intent, and by conflating the two it muddies the water when trying to talk about the realities of sexism on the internet. If Misogyny is caused by poor perception of women, then widespread trolling in ways that appear to be misogynistic is caused by knowledge that there's a widespread strong emotional investment in combating it. The cultural implications are widely different and damn near opposites.

While I pretty much agree with what you are saying, especially on point of intent, which under most circumstances I would champion as vital, I think the willingness to throw around misogynistic slander is important. They may not be doing this with the intent of being misogynistic, but they are perfectly happy to act in a misogynistic manner to get what they want, the point being people who have an issue with misogyny tend not to be willing to act in a misogynistic manner under any circumstances, which I think does matter in regards to the perception of women within the community. Also, I don't think we should assume all of them were doing it simply out the desire to troll. Though for the purposes of this thread, it doesn't matter that much, the fact that they are willing to act as such assholes just speaks to bob's point about the problems our gaming culture is producing. I know, as you have previously said, that there is a divide between 4chan culture and gaming culture, but they're not mutually exclusive and the important bit is that many from the 4chan part of things would certainly consider themselves part of the gaming and geek community.

 

[runic knight]

She is talking about damsels specifically, not about all female characters. I bolded the relevant section in your post. That was a massive hyperbole and not something Anita has actually said.

Fair enough about the original part, but even so them being put into distress should not make all of who that person was before hand moot just because of that one moment. The moment they are in distress does not define the woman as a whole, and I think it's shallow to see the "damsel" only for that one instance. She isn't looking at the character as a whole, only that one moment, and that's a major building block to some of her arguments.

There is also the story narrative to take into account and how the purpose of the story that guides the games is about the player character most of the time. Asking why a damsel doesn't rescue herself is like asking why a shop keeper doesn't try to fight the evil warlord even though he has infinite potions and every weapon and armor in the game. It is the reason that an untrained hero can save the world in the first place. Self serving and shallow plot they may be, but equal relative to all the other tropes that are over used in the same fashion. The only issue with damsels is that the "rescue x character" is more often female then male and it is the statistic of it rather then the trope itself that is the complaint. After all, if it was the trope of "rescue the ruler/family member" that caused the harm she alludes to, then it would be a universally harmful one, not a sex-based harmful one. Instead it is the statistical pattern she presents as the problem, yet she uses the trope as the cause of harm, a disconnected logic.

Why are damsels/hostages considered bad? because they disempower the one being rescued (no, not women, but any character who could be called a damsel). But why does she present this as it matters? Because more games are by the numbers gender-marketed ones that use formulaic story telling to assign gender to avatars that represent ideas rather then characters that represent actual individuals. Or in short, more games are marketed towards males, so the love interest, based on gay/straight probability, would be female to have largest net appeal of target demographic, and this is bad because it means more females are damsels and that means it disempowers women.

Her entire argument hinges on the statistical pattern of the ones being rescues being female rather then any inherent, universal problems with the trope. If the trope was harmful, then it is universally harmful and any male character rescued should be seen as equally disempowered. Rescue the president trope should be seen as the same sort of negativity as any rescue the queen or princess or female ruler. This would need to be regardless of how often the tropes are or are not used, not because of it. The very nature of attempting to define it otherwise is based in a false pretense that there needs to be some balance of the sexes in any given role of a story. There does not, as lack of inclusion is not prohibition and not marketing towards is not the same as discrimination.

 

[Quadocky]

You're wrong on just about everything, Geek culture hasn't won a thing, Geek Culture has just been hijacked and taken away from geeks.

I disagree. Its not possible for geek culture to be hijacked because its basically a formal/informal media based fandom. Media which is created by... media creators can not hijack geek culture so much reflect it in parody.

I never liked most geek cultures anyway, they suffer the same problem I find in all geek cultures that will always annoy the hell outta me. This is because many geeky circles contain the most anti-social people imaginable. I don't mean shy people, I mean people who are just plain mean, and say mean things.

 

[leviadragon99]

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?

And yet people do still clearly hear them, because they're still an issue that exists, because they're still loud and creative enough to force themselves to be heard. The very fact that we're having this discussion proves that they are being heard, because we know the problem exists and is putting people off even if you refuse to acknowledge it.

 

[Uhura]

Fair enough about the original part, but even so them being put into distress should not make all of who that person was before hand moot just because of that one moment. The moment they are in distress does not define the woman as a whole, and I think it's shallow to see the "damsel" only for that one instance. She isn't looking at the character as a whole, only that one moment, and that's a major building block to some of her arguments.

IMO it seems that she is just disappointed with characters who initially show promise but are later turned into just another damsel. I didn't get the impression that she outright dismisses them as shitty characters. In fact, she says "However this extra character development tends to make their eventual disempowerment all the more frustrating.". To me that sounds like she just dislikes the damsel trope, not that she thinks that the characters themselves are immediately turned worthless if/when they are 'damseled'. Those are two very different things.

 

[Proeliator]

Spoiler: Because Reply Tunnels scare me

So we should be like Nerdfighters?

Or should we be like Love and Tolerate Bronies?

I think we should go the first route, but I'm cool for whatever man. It's your playground too, just don't forget to be awesome.
(I've just stared watching all of Brotherhood 2.0; I'm starting to like it. Plus I wonder what this discussion would be like in your pants...)

Edit: and, by random happenstance, there is a French the Llama profile pic above me. I am without words

Or there was until I got a low content warning (oops)... I guess I should have put more than an "I agree with everything Movie Bob had to say" comment huh?

Anyway...

Yeah; Brotherhood 2.0 is awesome. Enjoy (and good luck) making your way through it.

As for the topic at hand, I think we need to be an amalgamation of Bronies, Nerd Fighters, Whovians - who (and yes that who is a pun) are known for their pretty open minded positions - and a lot of the other tolerant factions of geek culture/fandom. I don't know if it will happen, but I sure hope it does.

Spoiler: BTW: For anyone who isn't aware of Nerd Fighters"

(The fist is bigger than mine on my moniter. It was an incredible fist bump)

Also, I believe I am all three of those things, Whoooo! Who's ahead of the curve!
Currently in 2008 of vlogbrothers. Have yet to get to ftl. I await gleefully.
DFTBA

 

[Khanht Cope]

I'm British and don't watch Doctor Who, but I'm very curious to ask what you're inferring it represents to you or is supposed to represent to American viewers; or rather, why it's odd that it'd be popular in the States.

 

[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?

And yet people do still clearly hear them, because they're still an issue that exists, because they're still loud and creative enough to force themselves to be heard. The very fact that we're having this discussion proves that they are being heard, because we know the problem exists and is putting people off even if you refuse to acknowledge it.

And honestly, if people are put off because someone (who, again, can easily be silenced) is saying mean things, then fuck 'em.

What would you have me do? This whole "we need to stop saying hurtful things on Xbox Live!' thing is garbage, accomplishes nothing, and in fact accomplishes less than nothing because it just tells the trolls that they're getting a reaction.

If you refuse to acknowledge them, you deny them their power. Trolls only look for a reaction, and the more passive aggressive the reaction (ie bitching about it on forums), the more direct and forceful they become to get a direct action.

 

[Machine Man 1992]

I'm British and don't watch Doctor Who, but I'm very curious to ask what you're inferring it represents to you or is supposed to represent to American viewers; or rather, why it's odd that it'd be popular in the States.

Being an American who's into Doctor Who is considered the epitome of geekiness, because Who is very much a niche show over here.

It takes considerable nerd chops to be current with the various incarnations of the Doctor, hell, you're a Saint of Nerds if you know what TARDIS stands for.

 

[JimB]

I'm very curious to ask what you're inferring it represents to you or is supposed to represent to American viewers; or rather, why it's odd that it'd be popular in the States.

America exports culture. We do not import it.

 

[Helmholtz Watson]

Okay, can you not do the point by point thing? It's generally very distracting and makes not want to read your response. In any case...

Forgive me if this sounds combative, because that isn't my intent, but I actually dislike full responses because I always have to go back to read what I wrote to understand what you are saying, and I feel like the point thing is more natural because it mimics real conversations. I'm not saying that you can't reply in full responses, just that I'm not as comfortable replying in full response as I am by using the "point thing".

I'm trying to say the latter should be implemented more. This is NOT banning as the person who is saying the statement in the first place is not forcibly removed.

Fair enough, then let me just that in the future you should make that more clear in your original post because your first post came off as though you supported banning those who say things that you find offensive. That said, I realize now that I misunderstood what you were originally trying to say and I apologize for that mistake on my part.

I was trying to say that there is usually an underlining connection between what people say and what people do.

And I stated how that was absurd to make the connection, because the trash talk that people do in games like COD don't usually result into effecting the real world. Thus it seems absurd to even bring up "misogynistic laws" in the first place because they hold no relevance.

The double standard was saying that my ideas would lead to censorship laws while also stating that the cesspool (is there another word for this? I can't think of any and it's starting to get old) people state will have no affect on laws being made.

Well you see the difference is that you are a consumer who is vocal about the product you use, and apparently microsoft has been taken note of these complaints [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/125633-Xbox-Ones-Reputation-System-Locks-Harassers-Into-Their-Own-Hell](though additively they are not completely censoring these people). On the other hand, a bratty, foul mouthed pre-teen can say every horrible word in the English language and that won't result into "misogynistic laws" being put into place.

Which, in addition to being a double standard is wrong as America just recently and is currently facing many laws that have HUGE racist and sexist undertones. North Carolina is trying to pass an Anti-Islamic (I believe it's anti-Shari specifically but I'm not 100% sure). Is video game chat the cause? Of course not, but it is showing a symptom of the problem.

Again, you are bringing up subjects that hold no relevance to the conversation at hand. What laws America puts into place doesn't determine whether a foul mouthed teen from England or Australia will say vile things.

And yes, I'm aware of those forms of public communications. But that isn't a comparable to something akin to an internet video game chat. You do realize that such forms of public communications have rules and regulations to follow, right? And that they still have consequences. It might not be legal consequences but social ones, but consequences all the same. Compared to someone not being able to harass others. Note that I'm not saying that he was engaging in name calling, but harassment as I know that there is a difference.

True, the social consequences are that if I say something vile in a park, I can be called out on it, and if I say something vile on Xbox Chat I can also be called out on it.

For example, in the first sentence of this reply, I ask that you not reply to this post in a point by point format. I'm not saying that you can't do that. You are free to do it. I'm just asking.

Again, please don't take this the wrong way but I find it difficult to read full responses and I dislike typing in such a fashion because then I have to go back and forth to figure out what you are responding to. That said, I understand if you feel more comfortable giving full responses.

 

[Fluxlife]

Hey Bob. I am a Transgendered woman, long time fan and Blogger who often Blogs about your work.

Hearing you use words like Cisgendered and Transphobic Makes me happy. To see you recognize the Trans community and Speak out against that kind of discrimination Makes me Respect you all the more. Thankyou. Guarantee Ill be Telling my Readers to check this one out. I just wish I didn't hafta post this with a Dummy account. Keep up the great work friend.

 

[oooooooooooooooooooooooooo]

Odd, I never got a message telling me you replied. Anyway, onwards

That's entirely irrelevant to showing how her Kickstarter was spammed in 4chan as the Kickstarter proceeded which has been the point for quite some time now.

Alright, well I'll simply say then, there is no proof at all that had anything to do with her. There's absolutely no reason why we should she treat her in any way other than innocent until proven guilty.

I addressed the accusation more thoroughly in this post, if you're interested: http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/6.820668-The-Big-Picture-With-Great-Power?page=12#19822543

Hyperbole isn't "slipping words into your mouth". All I'm saying is that if she wants to make a claim that video games cause domestic violence and that "games are misogynist against women" then she needs some data to back up her argument. All I've seen is her opinion and out of context examples that once you look at them holistically, they aren't as dire as she claims. So again, show me an example.

And if you like being manipulated, that's your choice. I just think it's entirely stupid and pointless in creating an argument that only supports a minority of viewers in the first place.

Perhaps not, but it's also not addressing the points I'm actually putting forward. That's also not her claim, as far as I am aware. I admittedly haven't seen most of her work, but I haven't heard her claim that videogames cause domestic anywhere. Also, 'games are misogynist against women' isn't quite accurate either, rather that games tend to fall back on tropes that tend to be misogynistic out of laziness. And yes, she does outright say she believes it's usually out of laziness. You want examples of misogyny in videogames? I could probably give dozens, I certainly think many of her examples were valid. As I said though, this is not the thread for it, so you know, pick the thread or say you want to discuss it via pm and I'll certainly follow you to that. Also there's no need for this 'if you like being manipulated' or accusations of ranting and raving stuff, lets just stick to addressing each other's arguments.

You can't focus on the "attacks" without looking at the criticisms? Is the entire moral viewpoint that 1 person out of 10 saying something you don't agree with going to be your focus? You haven't addressed the criticisms nor have you looked at the entire point. So my point stands that if you will not address the criticisms, then you can't address a minority viewpoint.

Further, it sounds like you're giving Anita a free pass to antagonize a community based on her sex. Personally, I want her to have her arguments stand up on their merits without sophistry being involved. She's yet to answer criticisms, but she'll name and shame people that don't agree with her. Why do something so intellectually dishonest? Again, I wouldn't care, but doing something so misleading is not a way to win people to a certain point of view.

I looked at that, but as I recall, She bears blame by antagonizing these people. Again, "For every action, there is an equal but opposite reaction". Why only engage trolls that are only tangentially related to gamers but expose their behavior and claim that they're the gaming community? That's the problem that I have with the situation. I also addressed this in the last part. She's leaving out context and critical information such as her own tweets. She's prepackaging this idea that she's the victim and that's misleading. That informs people of nothing but her own dishonesty. If we can't see her tweets, and we're only looking at the tweets of others, of course we're to feel automatically for Anita. But that doesn't address the issues of why she gets away with manipulating the public for actions that most didn't do.

And just at those examples, I can bring up one counterargument: Adria Richards. She manipulated people and of course, she received bad press by being dishonest to others. The point here is, if you want to say bad things about other people, expect a response. But you can't just dismiss everything as trolling when there's legitimate criticisms that might help the argument. You also can't focus on the trolls that aren't a part of the gaming community except when they attack someone who misleads people in the first place.

No, I'm saying whether or not there was valid criticism isn't relevant. Sexist attacks aren't a minority view point, they're not a viewpoint at all and any sort of discrimination should be addressed immediately. Sure, loads of people have perfectly valid criticisms of Anita and power to them for that, but are you trying to say that somehow justifies the others acting like sexist assholes? Like I said before, you seem to have made the mistake in thinking that I'm here championing Sarkeesian's arguments, I'm not, I'm here saying there are no circumstances, context or anything else that make any sort of sexist attack on anyone even the slightest bit acceptable. You say later that things aren't just black and, you're entirely right, but you need apply that everywhere, just because I have a problem with misogyny doesn't mean you can lump me in with the Sarkeesian bunch. And that is why I shall say yet again, this isn't about her. There could have been anyone pushing anyone pushing any sort of agenda or argument in place of Anita and I would be here saying a misogynistic reaction to them is unacceptable. I don't think Anita is as bad as you claim she is, she has some valid points and some points that are nonsense, but even if everything she said was complete garbage, that wouldn't justify anyone treating her in a misogynistic manner.

Adria Richards manipulated people? I agree it was not okay to complain about those guy's jokes on twitter with a picture of them, but that's not manipulation and it doesn't even slightly justify her getting sent a picture of herself having been decapitated with the caption "when I'm done" as well as the other threats she's apparently received. There is big gulf between, expect a reaction, and expect threats of death and rape, as well as a load misogyny thrown her way.

You're moving the goal posts here. Anita claimed they were a coordinated attack and I responded by where that information is. That's dishonesty. Second, I'm specifically claiming that the "evidence" she has is mostly criticism and not sexist. You're focusing on one without a focus on the other and that's a biased viewpoint.

I'm not moving anything, Anita can claim what she likes, I keep saying this isn't about her and you keep trying to throw me back into her support group. And I agree, a fair number of those response, while not particularly well thought out, certainly weren't trying to be sexist attacks. But then again, a fair number certainly were and, as I say above, one doesn't justify the other.

Let's look at the timeline on Jennifer Helpler shall we?

October 11 2006* - Jennifer Hepler says that she doesn't play games and skips gameplay for dialogue. People on the forums decide to satirize her.

October 11 2007 - EA announces plans to buy Bioware

January 10, 2011 - EA promotes a promotional diary with her in it

March 8, 2011 - DA2 hits shelves and has mostly positive reviews

December 13, 2011 - Knights of the Old Republic is released

February 14, 2012 - Kotaku publishes "BioWare Writer Describes Her Gaming Tastes; Angry Gamers Call Her a ?Cancer?

March 6, 2012 - Mass Effect 3 comes out

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Now really think about this... Why would it take six years for a company to notice things that were talked about so long ago? They had already discussed and debated those issues, and now you have people like Jim Sterling talking about this stuff and making detractors look like misogynistic idiots instead of recognizing their own failures. Could it really be that this is nothing more than fake controversy, provoked by a company that is known for very bad publishing decisions that hurt the consumers? Just a thought, but maybe what you view as "misogynist" is inherently flawed if it can't take criticism, satire, and parody into consideration.

I'm going to go with the context doesn't justify the response point here again. Yes, a fair amount of the backlash was people being assholes in ways other than misogynistic ones, but there was a misogynistic response, and provoked or not, it wasn't justified.

Not buying the argument that nothing happened besides her trolling 4chan for money. I don't think trolls are indicative of the gaming community and I won't buy that argument until I see actual data that supports her argument. And seeing as how she has closed herself off to all points of view besides her own, it shows that something is amiss since she can't hold up to criticism. Even now, you've just written that those comments were "negative insults" when I'm saying they're criticism of her work. And again... If you want to talk about sexism, you should recognize that she's perfectly fine with satire and parody and free speech so long as it doesn't affect the status quo. That's not free speech. That's a press release.

Well as I say, you lack the proof for your first point. Anyway, no one has said trolls are indicative of the gaming community, in fact I quite obviously said in my last post that these people are not the majority. But they don't have to be, they are a product of geek culture and we should addressing them as such. You also can't lump all the comments into one group. Sure, some of them were attempts to critique, though I don't think "oh shut the fuck up ****" or "as soon as women are as capable as men" fall under that definition, both of which are comments from her twitter link that I posted.

Let me repeat this for you...

4chan is a community. You also have the gamer community. You have a few gamers that are related to 4chan. There's a little overlap, but not a lot. You're dealing with two different circles of people and one is bigger than the other. It's not a black and white situation where "gamers = misogyny" which is the point of criticizing you for trying to confuse the two. All I'm saying is that if you want to confuse two different cultures that are very distinct, that's a ridiculous thing to do and hurts your argument.

*http://www.killerbetties.com/killer-women-jennifer-hepler/

** http://blog.bioware.com/2012/06/11/interview-with-senior-writer-jennifer-hepler/

*** http://kotaku.com/5886674/bioware-writer-describes-her-gaming-tastes-angry-gamers-call-her-a-cancer

A little overlap? I would be very surprised if the vast majority of 4chan weren't gamers. And again, no one is claiming gamers are all misogynistic, I have now in fact repeatedly said the opposite. Yes, a lot of gamers don't identify with 4chan, but a lot of 4chan users identify as gamers and that's what matters because it's the gamer side of things we're addressing.

 

[Yuuki]

I admittedly haven't seen most of her work, but I haven't heard her claim that videogames cause domestic anywhere.

Admittedly you haven't seen most of her work, so of course you're not going to hear a lot of what she claims
It was becoming increasingly obvious that pretty much ALL her work could be easily dismissed by extremely simple statements like:
> "...and?"
> "so what?"
> "it's fiction, get the fuck over it"
> "if the tropes ultimately WORK, why will they ever vanish from the industry?"

You know, really basic obvious shit. Feminists could only reply "umm...because we don't like it! Stop it, stop it, just stop it!". That's what their responses boiled down to.

Anita had to say something to make her research seem relevant to the real world, and so inevitably we heard this in the Damsels In Distress Part 2 video as her attempt to "raise the stakes" (so to speak):

It?s especially troubling in-light of the serious real life epidemic of violence against women facing the female population on this planet. Every 9 seconds a woman is assaulted or beaten in the United States and on average more than three women are murdered by their boyfriends husbands, or ex-partners every single day.

A sizable chunk of the industry is still unfortunately trapped in the established pattern of building game narratives on the backs of brutalized female bodies.
Violence against women is a serious global epidemic; therefore, attempts to address the issue in fictional contexts demands a considerable degree of respect, subtlety and nuance. Women shouldn?t be mere disposable objects or symbolic pawns in stories about men and their own struggles with patriarchal expectations and inadequacies.

And then finally this, which is used by her supporters as "defense":

Likewise engaging with these games is not going to magically transform players into raging sexists. We typically don?t have a monkey-see monkey-do, direct cause and effect relationship with the media we consume. Cultural influence works in much more subtle and complicated ways, however media narratives do have a powerful cultivation effect helping to shape cultural attitudes and opinions.
So when developers exploit sensationalized images of brutalized, mutilated and victimized women over and over and over again it tends to reinforce the dominant gender paradigm which casts men as aggressive and commanding and frames women as subordinate and dependent.

The above is copied directly from the transcript, I don't believe in giving her videos more views than they deserve...but you can dig through it to find those quotes if you want.

 

[oooooooooooooooooooooooooo]

Admittedly you haven't seen most of her work, so of course you're not going to hear a lot of what she claims
It was becoming increasingly obvious that pretty much ALL her work could be easily dismissed by extremely simple statements like:
> "...and?"
> "so what?"
> "it's fiction, get the fuck over it"
> "if the tropes ultimately WORK, why will they ever vanish from the industry?"

You know, really basic obvious shit. Feminists could only reply "umm...because we don't like it! Stop it, stop it, just stop it!". That's what their responses boiled down to.

Anita had to say something to make her research seem relevant to the real world, and so inevitably we heard this in the Damsels In Distress Part 2 video as her attempt to "raise the stakes" (so to speak):

It?s especially troubling in-light of the serious real life epidemic of violence against women facing the female population on this planet. Every 9 seconds a woman is assaulted or beaten in the United States and on average more than three women are murdered by their boyfriends husbands, or ex-partners every single day.

A sizable chunk of the industry is still unfortunately trapped in the established pattern of building game narratives on the backs of brutalized female bodies.
Violence against women is a serious global epidemic; therefore, attempts to address the issue in fictional contexts demands a considerable degree of respect, subtlety and nuance. Women shouldn?t be mere disposable objects or symbolic pawns in stories about men and their own struggles with patriarchal expectations and inadequacies.

And then finally this, which is used by her supporters as "defense":

Likewise engaging with these games is not going to magically transform players into raging sexists. We typically don?t have a monkey-see monkey-do, direct cause and effect relationship with the media we consume. Cultural influence works in much more subtle and complicated ways, however media narratives do have a powerful cultivation effect helping to shape cultural attitudes and opinions.
So when developers exploit sensationalized images of brutalized, mutilated and victimized women over and over and over again it tends to reinforce the dominant gender paradigm which casts men as aggressive and commanding and frames women as subordinate and dependent.

The above is copied directly from the transcript, I don't believe in giving her videos more views than they deserve...but you can dig through it to find those quotes if you want.

Fair enough, I have in fact seen that video so I should have remembered that, and I will agree that on this point she's wrong. Mind you, I will say, as I was pointing out to a few other posters on this thread, there is a distinction between being a feminist and being one who is a Sarkeesian supporter.

 

[Uhura]

And then finally this, which is used by her supporters as "defense":

Likewise engaging with these games is not going to magically transform players into raging sexists. We typically don?t have a monkey-see monkey-do, direct cause and effect relationship with the media we consume. Cultural influence works in much more subtle and complicated ways, however media narratives do have a powerful cultivation effect helping to shape cultural attitudes and opinions.
So when developers exploit sensationalized images of brutalized, mutilated and victimized women over and over and over again it tends to reinforce the dominant gender paradigm which casts men as aggressive and commanding and frames women as subordinate and dependent.

The above is copied directly from the transcript, I don't believe in giving her videos more views than they deserve...but you can dig through it to find those quotes if you want.

Fair enough, I have in fact seen that video so I should have remembered that, and I will agree that on this point she's wrong. Mind you, I will say, as I was pointing out to a few other posters on this thread, there is a distinction between being a feminist and being one who is a Sarkeesian supporter.

Don't know why the bolded part is in any way controversial. Isn't the current 'geek-is-cool movement' based on this same principle?

 

[oooooooooooooooooooooooooo]

Don't know why the bolded part is in any way controversial. Isn't the current 'geek-is-cool movement' based on this same principle?

For me personally it's less that and more that it's a small step from gaming being somehow causational or responsible for domestic violence to games are causationally involved in people acting violently, ie school shootings and such. They may perhaps be some minor factor for a few individuals, but in the scope of environment, up-bringing, mental stability, etc they are minor enough to be essentially irrelevant.

 

[Uhura]

Don't know why the bolded part is in any way controversial. Isn't the current 'geek-is-cool movement' based on this same principle?

For me personally it's less that and more that it's a small step from gaming being somehow causational or responsible for domestic violence to games are causationally involved in people acting violently, ie school shootings and such. They may perhaps be some minor factor for a few individuals, but in the scope of environment, up-bringing, mental stability, etc they are minor enough to be essentially irrelevant.

I don't think Anita was implying that gaming was somehow directly responsible for domestic violence, especially since she explicitly stated that "We typically don't have a monkey-see monkey-do, direct cause and effect relationship with the media we consume.". I think it's more of an issue with trivialization. A lot of people already have really fucked up views about women (and men too) who suffer from domestic violence, and the trivialization of the issue does not really help. I mean, she says:

Anita
Even though most of the games we're talking about don't explicitly condone violence against women, nevertheless they trivialize and exploit female suffering as a way to ratchet up the emotional or sexual stakes for the player.

To use another example, I think it's fair to say that the trivialization of prison rape in popular media is problematic. It's not responsible for prison rape but it reinforces the fucked up views people already have of prison rape.

Also, saying that popular media has an effect on peoples attitudes and opinions is not the same as saying that popular media causes violence. Those are two different things, and it's not really a 'slippery-slope' situation where admitting the first part legitimizes the second part.