LONG VERSION:
I must say I can pretty much disagree with most everything in the article. "In Japan...women were seen as inherently fragile and their 'heroism' was defined by their maidenly virtue..." Citation, please! I'm sorry, is this author talking about the Japan that exists in our world? Or is she talking about Europe? Or is she, in fact, talking about the Japan that Westerners
think they know about but, in fact, don't have a clue about. For example, in the Tokugawa period, is she talking about samurai? Ainu? Peasants? Merchants? Imperial? Courtesan? Each strata of Japanese society had different expectations of their women, and absolutely NO class of women in Japan (in any era) were ever expected to let their "heroism" rest
solely on their 'maidenly virtue'.
Also, her reference to the
Onna Daigaku - really? One could make the same argument about the Bible being a guidebook for proper womanly behavior for the same time period in Europe, but historical study shows that although many people
wrote about the Bible as an guide for proper behavior, the vast majority of the society
didn't actually hold women to that ideal save through lip service. You'd think she only knows about Japanese culture from one or two books and not from actual historical study... If that's the case, then I challenge you to think about this: how accurate are Disney movies and Looney Tunes at portraying gender roles in the West? If you only read Shakespeare, what would your expectation be of women in Renaissance Padua? If you only read historical romance novels, how would you describe a typical woman of 19th century England? Did all women in the middle of the twentieth century really live and die by the Emily Post guide to etiquette?
As for her comments directly relating to video games: these are all things that Western women raised to believe in the Modern Feminist myth *want* to hear, because it feeds into what they've been told their entire lives. (Don't get me wrong, I appreciate the Feminist movement. After all, I wouldn't be able to do what I do in my job right now if it weren't for the feminist movement in the last century.) As other people have pointed out, there have been PLENTY of strong women characters in JRPGs. In fact, in the game that the picture for the article comes (Shadow Hearts) from are *at least* two strong women characters: the French spy Margerete and the Japanese Lieutenant Colonel Kawashima. They are both strong women who have a no-nonsense attitude and a female nature - Margarete is a shameless flirt, and Kawashima is a love interest of one of the other NPCs. Also, what does the titular 'Wussy RPG girl' Alice do, after seeing her 'defender' Yuri disappear in a horrible catastrophe?
She spends the next six months on her own, making her own way, fighting her own fights, while searching for him. Does she have help? Sure, as a game mechanic. But the story clearly shows her in control of the party. Does she fall into a subordinate role when her man reappears? Sure, also as a gaming mechanic. (And I haven't even addressed Koudelka, the woman who drives the main characters along their path throughout the majority of the story...)
And that's just the characters from the game she happens to mention. I could go on and on. (For example, the second game in the Shadow Hearts series has one of my favorite female characters in any JRPG, Karin, who starts out as a soldier in an army in WWII.) Others have already mentioned many characters, so I won't.
Now, as a woman myself, I notice gender roles in games/books/movies/commercials, and I see bias all over the place. For instance, if you really stop and watch modern-day TV, the worst negative stereotypes on TV (shows or commercials) are always against
men, not women. Our society is just inured to it. Also, if you're going to complain about 'Wussy RPG girls', have enough intellectual honesty to admit that it goes both ways (male/female) and across all cultures of the developers (Japanese, Korean, American, European). Just because Mass Effect allows you to play male or female, don't think that represents equality of the sexes - it just means that the character is essentially gender neutral. (And, for the record, I think both
God of War and
Gears of War portray far more damaging sexual stereotyping of men than anything I've seen women 'subjected' to in the typical JRPG.) Anyone who thinks that Neo is a better character than Aerith, BTW, needs to pay more attention to symbolism, since they do
exactly the same thing.
However, this article is inaccurate at best, relying on Western stereotypes of other cultures at worst. She makes the common mistake most Westerners do, that a sexist society MUST be a bad society, as if gender division of roles is inherently
teh ebilist ebil [sic] of them all. As for wondering why these stereotypes still exist 300 years later... Ummm, I'm sorry, what version of the Western World does she live in where those exact same stereotypes are
not used all the time in
our own literature and media? Although that subject too big for discussion, the short answer: it ain't just Japan, baby. These stereotypes persist because of a mix of societal acceptaince, marketability, and smidgeons of truth thrown in here and there. In Japan, in the United States, in Europe:
everywhere.
Ahem. Sorry to the few of you who actually read this. Had to get it out.
