Tropes vs Women SECOND VIDEO - "Damsel in Distress: Part 2"

[Seneschal]

Though, she did royally miss the point when it came to the Timesplitters series, if you ask me. This and Dante's Inferno get a pass from me. (Dante's Inferno is an old story, adapted in to a videogame. Wouldn't be much of an adaptation if they changed that part of the story ...)

In the Divine Comedy, Beatrice is in Heaven, looks over Dante, and appeals to the angels to help him. She's the one who pops down into Hell to fetch Virgil to be his guide. At the top of the mountain of Purgatory, she presides over a court for Dante's sins and lays such a smack-down on him that the angels feel sorry. She then serves as his guide through Heaven. He never describes her with anything less than awe and is completely compliant and subservient to her. I mean, at the end, it's all still sexist towards both genders, but at least Dante gives women plenty of agency and an equal share of the afterlife.

The "adaptation" changed a great deal, including making the story more regressive regarding gender norms than the 700-year-old original. Now that's an accomplishment.

 

[TheFinalFantasyWolf]

Anyone care to mention which games get spoiled in this video?

I'd like to see it but I'm afraid to do so.

 

[Trinab]

All and all, I quite enjoyed it. It accurately pointed out the tropes, why they are used in games, and the inherent problems/assumptions that go with it.

As a writer the points she made are ones I've long considered, and actively try to avoid in my own works, and ones I would like to see somewhat banished from video games.

 

[General Twinkletoes]

"Sigh" thread is only two pages long and I already see entire posts completely demonizing people that don't agree with the poster. This happens EVERY TIME!

This is why we don't don't get thoughtful debate out of this videos! People don't want to sit down and debate about it, they want to insult people for having the poor judgement to have a different opinion!

C'mon, you post this in every controversial thread. How about be part of that change you seem so desperate for? Have a rational discussion with someone, instead coming into the thread and getting annoyed at everyone.

 

[invadergir]

Though, she did royally miss the point when it came to the Timesplitters series, if you ask me. This and Dante's Inferno get a pass from me. (Dante's Inferno is an old story, adapted in to a videogame. Wouldn't be much of an adaptation if they changed that part of the story ...)

In the Divine Comedy, Beatrice is in Heaven, looks over Dante, and appeals to the angels to help him. She's the one who pops down into Hell to fetch Virgil to be his guide. At the top of the mountain of Purgatory, she presides over a court for Dante's sins and lays such a smack-down on him that the angels feel sorry. She then serves as his guide through Heaven. He never describes her with anything less than awe and is completely compliant and subservient to her. I mean, at the end, it's all still sexist towards both genders, but at least Dante gives women plenty of agency and an equal share of the afterlife.

The "adaptation" changed a great deal, including making the story more regressive regarding gender norms than the 700-year-old original. Now that's an accomplishment.

Well, that's just plain pathetic on the dev's part. And utterly shameful too.

pewdiepie has every other video flagged. Get a grip.

Are his video's flagged so much in a SINGLE hour that it's taken down?

Several of his Alice: Madness Returns lets plays were taken within hours after he posted them. And by several, I mean 3 or 4 out of the 13 that were made at the time. Do you think a highly visible and controversial figure would be immune?

Some of the youtube commenters were guessing that the thing the videos had in common was he made fun of Justin Beiber. Who knew that the Beiberites were as passionate as your misogynist Dude Bros!

 

[Erttheking]

"Sigh" thread is only two pages long and I already see entire posts completely demonizing people that don't agree with the poster. This happens EVERY TIME!

This is why we don't don't get thoughtful debate out of this videos! People don't want to sit down and debate about it, they want to insult people for having the poor judgement to have a different opinion!

C'mon, you post this in every controversial thread. How about be part of that change you seem so desperate for? Have a rational discussion with someone, instead coming into the thread and getting annoyed at everyone.

I've been doing a little bit of chatting in this thread, but mostly I formed a group centered around this concept and take my talking there.

 

[Rblade]

She shouldn't include titels like duke nukem, it diludes her point because everyone hates that piece of garbage. Same goes to a degree for things like GTA 3 and god of war (kratos murders everyone he meets not just his mother).

That said I can agree to the general points put out, although I think it is pretty much always caused by unimagintive and safe repeating of old stories instead of any kind of malice against females.

I hope she comes up with solutions and what she actually thinks would be a good overall balance. That might make the (male)gaming community less defensive about it. might.....

 

[Brown_Coat117]

Well my impression after seeing this video is just about the same as all of her work that I've seen. Here are a few points.

-Stiff unnatural delivery.
-Using the word misogyny as a buzz word with no consideration for it's actual meaning.
-Taking information out of context to serve her own purpose.
-Disregarding any information that doesn't serve to support her social/political views.
-Presenting generalized tropes as holistic plot analysis.
-Shoehorning in real world problems so she can quote stats to make her video seem more informative, and her actual subject more weighty than it actually is.
-Lack of hard data to support the overwhelming majority of her assertions.

I could list more but don't feel like it.

 

[SickBritKid]

Whenever anyone mentions Sarkeesian and tries to prop her spew up as "valid", I like to point to this two-part series made about her and then go about my day. I highly encourage anyone who dislikes her to do the same.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p6gLmcS3-NI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LpFk5F-S_hI

 

[McMindflayer]

Yes, but when the protagonist is almost always male and the character who gets kidnapped, murdered and so on, is almost always female, that's a problem. I personally don't much care for the fact that it's poor storytelling, my main concern is that the genders of these two character archetypes are distressingly unchanging. This whole issue wouldn't be a problem if we had a more or less equal distribution of stories where a man rescues another man, a woman rescues a man, a man rescues a woman, and a woman rescues another woman. While I would agree that the overuse of the trope itself is trite storytelling, the main problem is that it continues to be used in overwhelmingly gendered ways.

That's the thing though. This isn't just poor writing. This is super poor writing. I'm saying this is writing that you don't even have someone think about poor. It's literally taken from the media from when they were kids. Kids stories and the majority of writing in the 60's and 70's (and now) are based around the idea that the hero(who is male) must save the princess. It's super simple and easy to grasp. To change the dynamic would be to THINK about the story for more than 10 minutes.

video games right now are at a first grade reading level. Very few reach 6th grade or later. To say that video games are adult entertainment(outside the fact that adults enjoy playing them) is laughable when in regard to story.

OT: I wonder if she'll mention the inversion braid does to the Damsel in Distress trope in her third video? Where you are told there is a damsel in distress and you must save her, but it turns out you are the one distressing her.

 

[Auron]

She shouldn't include titels like duke nukem, it diludes her point because everyone hates that piece of garbage. Same goes to a degree for things like GTA 3 and god of war (kratos murders everyone he meets not just his mother).

We do? I truly thought it was a beloved 80's action hero satirizing franchise. Now most people hated the new game that has nothing to do with hating good old Duke. Murdering everyone to hardcore activists is not important as long as their group of choice was among the billions of victims they usually feel justified enough to preach they've been singled out and demonized and only their group was killed and violated. It's kind of like my people did with the Nazis, they murdered people of every ethnicity as long as you opposed their views or acted against them but the Jewish got it worse somehow, it was terrible yes but my peers made a bigger case out of it for profit which is pretty obvious.

captcha - chuck norris, now there's an indiscriminate killer of humans, thank you captcha.

 

[Tsun Tzu]

All right... I'm watching it currently (as I type this) and will refute or agree with points as I see them.

These are my opinions. I'm not painting them as anything but.

1. Of course the trope isn't a product of "its time." It's been a part of literature since...hell, since literature began.

2. Yes. The trope is trite. It's a trope specifically because it's trite and uncreative on the part of the folks employing it. I'm not seeing the argument against it so much from a feminist point of view as a creative one.

3. The "damsel"s efforts to escape proving futile...makes sense from a narrative standpoint, obviously. If she could just kick her captor's ass and waltz out, sight unseen, then it sort of takes the plot out at the knees. It's also lazy and again, this sounds more like an argument for a broader depth of character traits/actions/plot with feminist stuff peppered in.

The moments in which the "damsel" aids the protagonist or, in Ico for example, outright saves him in the end are not simply "symbolic." Hell, from that angle, one could make the argument that the entire story is "symbolic." These events show a much greater deal of agency and capability on the part of the character than is being expressed in the video.

Considering that people tend to remember the beginning and ending of stories rather than the "core," I would argue that having those sorts of moments at the end, beginning, or at big points in the narrative, does not trivialize them in any way, shape, or form.

And the words, "it feels like" are not indicative of anything other than opinion on the part of the video maker.

4. Building emotional attachment to characters is not a negative thing. The females in the examples are weak. I'll give her that. However, I don't believe that to be the chief component in the romance element of the narrative. I'm not seeing this power imbalance idea either. "It feels like" she's projecting a bit here.

5. There really isn't anything wrong with the Max Payne, GoW, and etc. hook. I'd argue for a gender inversion of the trope. Again, it reeks of a lack of creativity more so than anything else.

Calling it "insidious" is alarmist. -.-

6. I agree on the lack of maturity in the medium. I disagree with the line about misogyny.

7. Surprise! They were dead the whole time! Lack of creativity, again... ex. see cop shows.

8. Again. Having the kill the damsel is just indicative of a lack of creativity. Male characters are subjected to this sort of thing too. Personally, if I were turned into a horrible monstrosity or something, I'd welcome and even ask for death too.

Side Note: The GTA example was funny. It would have been funny if it'd been your cousin in GTA4 too.

9. Duke Nukem Forever is not a good example of anything, save failure, let alone gaming.

10. ...She seriously compared this to domestic violence. How in god's name do you come to that conclusion?

11. Hey. She actually gave some recognition to the fact that it IS a trope which is perpetrated by all mediums.

12. Again, the comparisons to real life statistics. And...encouraging violence against women? In reference to #10, it's encouraging violence against the "other" which has taken said character, be it male or female, in an effort to save them. This is not a corollary for domestic violence. You only see that sort of thing if you're looking for it.

13. The developers haven't given it much thought because the ideas being presented aren't necessarily negative or "insidious."

14. She tacitly admits that media consumption does not lead to action...and then goes off the rails again.

15. The implication is not that the woman/daughter is a "possession." The implication is that they are a loved one and they've been taken from the protagonist. "Taken" meaning killed or abducted not that they've been absconded with like a loaf of bread.

16. I don't view failing to protect a loved one as being a failure or loss of masculinity. It's a loss of a loved one and guilt over failing to protect them. I'd imagine women feel the same emotion when a loved one has been taken from them. The need to protect those we care about is a decidedly human thing and is not limited to gender.



I...I got through it all. Woo! According to some of you posters, I'm open-minded by default for having done so.

Once again, these are my opinions. I don't expect others to share them. I also haven't asked for a kickstarter contribution for said opinions. >.>

 

[McMindflayer]

To be fair, she shouldn't include the original Duke Nukem and Dante's Inferno.
Duke Nukem is a spoof on every other game of the same type by turning everything up to 11. Oh this shooter has a little misogyny? Ours has super misogyny! You have to kill demons? You have to kill super demons! It's a parody and a villification of the system. It'd be like yelling at Bayonetta for being against women; It's the point.

Dante's Inferno (at least the scene's she's showing and I guess refering to) is based off a poem from the 14th century. You can't use the fact that they kill his wife as a plot point, when that's in the main text. Now, to be fair, they probably shouldn't have made Dante's Inferno into a game in the first place if they weren't going to do as much justice to the story as possible. Rather than the idea that Dante kept on fighting a ton of demon's and that gives you a good game.

 

[Angus]

This video is simply inconsistent- and you could say the problem/trope she brings up isnt really a problem/trope.

In my view, the "euthanised damsel" clearly shows more traditional "masculine" traits in the girls.:accepting your faith, doing the right thing even if it kils you.
And a more "feminine" gang of traits in the men: sensitive, forced to do something horrible, being a victim, crying in a few scenes etc.

And also the Damsel asking the guy to kill her- he doesent just get to do it, shes the agent and the authority- Im the one letting you kill me, its alright.
Its something really positive, guys need the girl to "order it" because as we all know in our hearts(no matter what feminists might say), we arent really comfortable with violence against women, especially when men are the ones doing it. Exept as very bad guys to be murdered ofc.


This "trope" breaks against the norm, and thats why its so emotional!


Thats not negative at all,

Thats really good!!

 

[Darken12]

That's the thing though. This isn't just poor writing. This is super poor writing. I'm saying this is writing that you don't even have someone think about poor. It's literally taken from the media from when they were kids. Kids stories and the majority of writing in the 60's and 70's (and now) are based around the idea that the hero(who is male) must save the princess. It's super simple and easy to grasp. To change the dynamic would be to THINK about the story for more than 10 minutes.

video games right now are at a first grade reading level. Very few reach 6th grade or later. To say that video games are adult entertainment(outside the fact that adults enjoy playing them) is laughable when in regard to story.

I don't disagree with any of that, but it's not just poor writing. There is a very strong fear of what's different in the industry, a fear of appealing to demographics that aren't white straight males, and a simultaneous belittling and underestimation of that very same demographic they cling to. The white straight male characters we get are very archetypical, and the industry fears stepping outside the entrenched tropes that it has set up over the years. It's not just that the writing of most games is terrible, it's the fact that even the well-written games still cling to these harmful tropes out of fear of alienating their audience. Jim Sterling did a whole episode on how developers are flat-out told not to make games with female protagonists.

The game industry, at its core, is deathly afraid of its consumer base, but it simultaneously clings to it for dear life. It's a very toxic, abusive relationship, where the game industry perpetuates harmful business practices because it considers its consumer base to be animals. That's why misogynistic tropes get perpetuated, because the game industry is convinced its audience will reject anything that is not the same old safe tropes that have proven to succeed in the past.

 

[SilentRonin]

Is Anita's thinking the end result of the devolution of modern feminism in America, In other country's feminism is still very much about gender equality. Not the petty bitterness and general loathing that seems to plague a good deal of main US feminist groups.

I have a feminist friend at my work who I have very civil conversations with, and she very much dislikes the way the "main stream" feminist groups are degrading the credibility of the feminist movement in the US.