Does sexist tropes in video games influence behavior? Violence =/= Sexism?

[Lovely Mixture]

Instead, we get get Gamergate, which is riddled with sexism problems to the point in insanity. Hmmmm.

Allegedly. Meanwhile the women and minorities who support GamerGate are insulted, ignored, and accused of being sock puppets.

Yet somehow this rarely gets focused on.

 

[neoontime]

I know you say your done but I just want to explain I agree and disagree with your points. That's cause I feel you say one thing one way and one thing the other. I have not doubts that the -isms depicted in media are different from those acted upon in real life. The way I think; One is a thought that simply demonstrates the idea, and the other does the same while possibly leading to the "direct attack" (in parenthesis since I can't break it down into as simply physical actions and/or attempts to encourage those on an individual or group). It seems your responses, you've denied the ability of those -isms to be present and also acknowledged their existence by stating their differences (acknowledging that -isms aren't something exactly physical but ideological). Other than that, if you have time, I want to address points I'm confused by in your post. I understand if your done and don't have to to reexplain anything, you stated your tired already, but I'd at least like to understand your viewpoint better since its beneficial to me.

And since a virtual Z-ism and a real world Z-ism are not directly realted, we needed those millenniums of critique to analyze these topics.
I don't understand what you mean by this. Maybe you interpreted me saying that we needed those years rather than that I was saying that people have been talking about present -isms through their works. More of saying that artist will intentionally make a point of the the -isms, (point that their present in art) to reflect their views on it or to make a point on the morality of it to convince a reader to think a certain way.
We don't know. Art is ambiguous. It is open to interpretations.
The thing is, I consider human interaction and reasoning just as ambiguous and open to interpretation. We have no real way of knowing what people think and that's why we use merits for a way to reason why someone did what they did. People are systematically rational, therefore more often reasonable than a fictional character, but that still doesn't keep away from the fact that we can't know everything that will influence someone's logic for why they think and do things. At least with a fictional character you got to only understand the artist and the cues they'll leave behind to sometimes explain things. To me, that's why I think ambiguous are does not mean people shouldn't try to interpret it a way as we interpret the ambiguousness of life and interaction as well.

This is not really my discussion to be honest. Because I am not really a part of the western world etc etc. But this discussion vividly mirrors another situation that I am painfully in, and from which I've been successfully escaping on gaming sites for quite some time.
There's a widespread claim backed by propaganda that some people are fascist. And this claim is being used by press and average Joes to justify actions that I myself view as fascist.
And this shit is yet to bloom into a war that will bring much sorrow to everyone, including the dumb hate mongering bastards around me.
Ahem.

With that said it probably means that I hate war and hate mongering.
Now onto the topic and away from my increasingly crazy comrades.

I think this is propaganda you are talking about. Uhm... It's tricky but I long for clarity so let's try and sort this out.
There's art, there is propaganda, there is critique and there are demands to change and fix something that may or may not be called censorship. It is going to get dirty, isn't it?
An art piece is meant to bring you to a cathartic cleansing.
A propaganda piece is meant to hammer some point in.
This is why art is open to interpretations - you get to decide yourself on a change in you after what you have experienced.
The line between art and propaganda is blurred. (While we're at it, have a nice Extra Credits episode on the subject http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UP4_bMhZ4gA )
An artist has biases. His art piece is probably biased too. There can be art in propaganda and propaganda in art.
Propaganda is not necessarily bad, but I do believe that harmful propaganda is bad and should be called out.
And that is why critique and discussion should have their place.
Now, there's critique, and there's that other thing...
Let's try to clarify what critique is and what a critic does.
Critique is a piece of creative work. There are famous critics we know and whose word lives to this day and provides us with a point of view, gives us the power of the context, etc.
A critic is supposed to assess an art piece in it's fullest and give us his conclusion on weak and strong points of the thing. Also a critic is also inevitably biased, and is supposed to disclose his biases one way or another. This way we have a piece of mind from an author, that is biased, and a piece of mind from a critic that is biased. And we get to be in between.
But a critic does not get to wave flags. A critic is a creator, and not a revolutionist. As soon as he takes off for a pitchfork this is not critique anymore.
Critic does not get to make someone change something. A critic's work is as open to interpretations as the author's. It is not a final verdict.
Now who gets to change someone's work? Plenty of people that are on the team and a person who I believe is a censor.
Censorship is a tricky subject in itself, but do we really get away from propaganda and not toward it via censorship?

Now, why I think we do not get to fight games the way we should fight sexism.
I am a big fan of the word "adequate". In psychology "adequate" means that the response is on par with a stimulus. If we respond to a piece of creative work with a piece of creative work it is adequate. If we respond to an action with an action that is also adequate. If we respond to a piece of creative work with an action - this is what I have a problem with.
As I have stated before, sexism is an action. And if we say, that there's sexism in games ? it seems that it is reasonable to respond with an action. To stand up and... whatever.
But it is an illusion. Because whatever happens to game characters happens to characters and not people. That is why I say we do not get to fight "sexism in games".
A game if it is not a foul piece of hurtful propaganda, is arguably an art piece. It's not an action.
And if we want to respond to an art piece ? we assess and critique, and not rally and complain.
We have our "it could be stronger if", but we don't get to fix and change. Because it is not how things bloom.
Yes, people do get to interpret things, that is the point. But if we interpret to label and label to condemn no good can come of this. If you look for sexism you'll find it, okay. But what's next? We might as well go look for classism in the ancient greek philosophy and we'll find it, but will it do good for us?
Now we want change. Supposedly. We are the public, the subject of art. Art can be stronger by incorporating that change. And art wants to become stronger. For this change to bloom it needs sunlight. This is where critique comes in. This is where "stronger if" takes place. But there's no sunlight in a shitstorm.
I'm probably totally off the track by now, but this is what I have in mind.

Thank you for being being very informative in your reply. You explained in great detail your view and provided much context to hold rational sense. I still think we differ in what registers as a critique and a complaint. First off I want to make a point that I think much of these "complaints" are not necessarily censorship. The word censorship has seems to hold a varying degree of meaning but power as well and I feel it holds much danger to thought when it is used to much. I in no way see pointing out sexism and any -ism as a complaint as the same thought and critique applies to other arts that are judged in the same manner. It's my understanding that people too often equate criticism of the genre, however petty and unreliable, relates to the traditional thought of censorship as no change of the original work is changed, rather simply criticized and disfavored from a purchase, not at all censorship by the traditional sense. Even the vitriolic comments and biased feminist articles come across to me as petty complaints that hold no power and therefore equal a weak call for censorship rather than the term itself. I view any critique and criticism as a chance to improve the whole genre, a second important task for a critic, and rather than dismiss most complaints as harmful to the art, I'll wait to anticipate any rational arguments that will come from all sides to make the subject "better". Yes, what is better is subjective but things such as characterization, setting, story, and motivation are things basic enough for writer and designers to understand if they take the time and effort to think it through. Of course their importance of these criteria is what influences them to improve and that importance is placed by critics. I feel all critique from the -isms benefit these criterias that makes these works objectively better. I can't say much about the comments of propaganda as it strays a bit from the subject and requires more understanding of the situation on my end. Either way, your view was very well constructed and I thank you for sharing it.

 

[lacktheknack]

Instead, we get get Gamergate, which is riddled with sexism problems to the point in insanity. Hmmmm.

Allegedly. Meanwhile the women and minorities who support GamerGate are insulted, ignored, and accused of being sock puppets.

Yet somehow this rarely gets focused on.

Allegedly.

(...That's what allegedly means, right? Because that's how you're using it. One doesn't have to dig deep to find all kinds of sexist dirt on the "heroes" of Gamergate, as well as Gamergaters acting like sexist twats, nor does one have to dig deep to find people abusing women and minorities supporting the movement. It's very easy to hate everyone on all sides in this case.)

 

[aliengmr]

First, there is no difference between "games make you violent" and "games make you sexist". Saying otherwise would be a double standard.

Disagree. The difference being that violence has very visible boundaries. We know it when we see it and for the most part, know its not real. There's really no confusion over what is a "violent act". Sexism is much different as its really hard to see for many. From my perception I wouldn't see it for the most part, but that's because I don't live with it. I think its effects are different because it reinforces existing beliefs.

Most people understand that walking up to someone and greeting with a punch to the face is a bad thing. We can't always tell what's sexist as not everyone has to deal with it.

Because of the subtle nature of sexism, it can have a minor effect where the not-so-subtle nature of violence doesn't.

And no I am not saying games make anyone sexist. Ultimately I do it as something that has to change immediately, but rather something we should just start to challenge in small ways. Alter a tired trope here and there. Not replacing all male characters with females. Just little things at the artists discretion.

 

[Tsun Tzu]

Yeah, this is the one point of contention in this whole conversation about video games that bugs the hell out of me. We argued for years that violent video games don't make you violent (because they don't), yet the second we get fully protected free speech from the Supreme Court on the matter, suddenly playing sexist games makes you a sexist. It's a pretty classic double standard - my cause is more important than your cause, so I'm going to ignore logic. Honestly, I see it as a self propelling scandal because the single men who play video games are often the most vocal about them. And by throwing the word "misogynist" at strangers who I'm sure desperately want relationships with women, you get a very angry response in return.

One is the connection between a stimulus and a behaviour and the other is a connection between a stimulus and an attitude. However, while violent videogames do not cause violence, they do heighten aggression. On a deeper level, exposure to violence can make one desensitized to it. Or, exposure to only one simplified narrative of an issue can lead to a warped understanding of it. Exposure like that is how you get Muslims being removed from planes for praying before a flight. If one's only exposure to Muslims is action movies, videogames, and foreign news stories, it would be understandable to have the conception that they only pray before blowing themselves up. But this is not the case.

Likewise, with women and media, a person may not "hate" women, but still may hold misogynist beliefs that have been constantly reinforced by media and culture. Ideas that women act irrationally (man, she went crazy!). Ideas that women are less competent (boobs on the ground, e.g.). Ideas of sexual entitlement (but I'm a nice guy!).

It's not just a problem in videogames, it's in most media. However, videogames, largely due to the youth of the industry and the overwhelming focus on a particular demographic, can be particularly bad offenders. Also, for the sake of discussion, it's probably a little more manageable to talk about just videogames rather than all of American culture. Although, even this topic is gigantic in i

Just...Just no. You're being needlessly pedantic and making your initial argument one of semantics and little else.

Violence in media is purported to enhance aggressive tendencies, which is an "attitude" and the violence is then a behavior that results from it. Sexism in media is purported to enhance sexist tendencies, which is an "attitude" and the sexist behavior is what results from it.

In the first case, it's been proven fallacious beyond the short term in much the same way as, say, a competitive sport enhances short term aggressive tendencies. In the second, absolutely zero has been brought forth as corroborative evidence.

If you'd like a nice rebuttal to the "desensitization" argument, then I'd advise looking no further than our own Jimothy Sterling's video on the subject...

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/jimquisition/6692-Desensitized-to-Violence

And you're taking individuals and their behavior and holding it up as evidence of the effects of perceived sexism in media. It's anecdotal, at best, and not at all relevant to the vast, vast, vast majority of people taking in said media...on top of this, you're failing to recognize, literally, every other variable, ie. upbringing, personal experience informing opinion, their mood at the time, etc. etc. etc. etc.

I also don't appreciate the attempt at divorcing video games from the rest of American culture, since, as we've all been made so redundantly 'aware,' video games do not exist in a vacuum.

 

[JohnFei]

We do know that TV can reduce Racism, and sexism! Television shows which become more representative do actually help people become less racist, and less sexist. Particularly for people who come from areas where they don't see many minorities. One of the best studies done on this, brought up the old cartoon "Teen Titans". Cyborg was brought up as a favorite character among many male white children who had never met an African-American person in their life.

...

If you want to bring about change in a society, you need to do it POSITIVELY. Not by criticizing and demeaning others, not by telling them their hobby is morally repugnant and reprehensible, not by freaking out and going after witch hunts for perceived injustice. But by befriending the community and showing how the change is better for everyone over all.

I like this approach. Brings to mind something I read about Star Trek... was there an astronaut who said Uhura was an inspiration? I remember reading something along those lines, forget the details.

I see a problem at the moment, though. People highlighting positive examples seem to get shouted down just the same as people criticising negative ones - just look at the amount of vitriol some critics have received for praising Gone Home. Some of it is just people with very specific ideas about how games should be, sure, but there seemed to be a fair amount of "you only liked this for social reasons, what a hack" floating around (even though the critics in question really did seem to appreciate the game for other reasons, too).

It probably ties into people taking criticism poorly ("this was bad" or "this could have been better" seem to often be taken as "this game is evil and so are you, jerk"), which I guess is another topic. It's frustrating, anyway.

I really don't see the people bringing up positive examples getting shot down, at least not by anit-feminists. Gone Home is an entirely different discussion, the game is controversial not because of the attached social issues but because of the gameplay issue. I can't think of any time someone specifically set out to highlight a really good example of a female character or an important woman in the game industry that was shouted down by anti-feminists.

On the other hand, I have seen a few of examples of someone highlighting a female character they think is good and feminists jumping down their throat and telling them they are sexist scum for liking a female character they think is problematic.

Maybe we just have been in different places.

Edit: I should also mention that the positive approach is exceedingly rare. For all the positive things feminism can do for video games, for all the great potential it represents, I find it extremely strange that the standard approach (to almost the complete exclusion of any other approach) of feminists is to point at things they don't like and say "bad!". I have said it before, there is no group collectively worse at selling a good idea that feminists.

Agree wholeheartedly.

The problem is, articles talking about positive female roles don't draw as much attention or clicks as articles crying bloody rape and misogyny.

One of the gg-sympathetic LGBT rights activists, jw, was writing a series of articles about good female characters. Guess how many people even saw them, let alone read em.

It's why people like AS and megaphone took center stage, to the horror of moderate fem gamers and rational feminists like CH Sommers. Hysteria and division sells.

 

[Batou667]

I've written this post three times now and we are becoming increasingly efficient at it and I'm hoping this time my browser won't eat it.

In a nutshell: No studies have ever found a correlation between violence in games and an increase in gamer's violence. I think it's safe to assume that a similar process of compartmentalisation happens when gamers play games with sexualised or sexist themes. The statistics show rape rates have been falling in the US since the early 1990s, and over the same period the market value of games has increased; so it's not just a case of correlation not implying causation, the correlation actually goes against the hypothesis.

I think at the very most we could say that games can reinforce and normalise existing attitudes - but then that's true of all media, not just gaming, and also of all attitudes, not just sex-related ones; which makes the statement completely banal. There certainly doesn't exist any kind of large-scale correlation between game content and real-world sexism.

 

[Lovely Mixture]

Instead, we get get Gamergate, which is riddled with sexism problems to the point in insanity. Hmmmm.

Allegedly. Meanwhile the women and minorities who support GamerGate are insulted, ignored, and accused of being sock puppets.

Yet somehow this rarely gets focused on.

Allegedly.

(...That's what allegedly means, right? Because that's how you're using it. One doesn't have to dig deep to find all kinds of sexist dirt on the "heroes" of Gamergate, as well as Gamergaters acting like sexist twats, nor does one have to dig deep to find people abusing women and minorities supporting the movement. It's very easy to hate everyone on all sides in this case.)

My point was more that instances of sexism on one-side ring a bit hollow when there is sexism present on the opposition.
Sexism is bad, but it's a smoke screen to the issue.

Allegedly was the wrong word to use, yes. Not sure what I was thinking, my apologies.

 

[lacktheknack]

Instead, we get get Gamergate, which is riddled with sexism problems to the point in insanity. Hmmmm.

Allegedly. Meanwhile the women and minorities who support GamerGate are insulted, ignored, and accused of being sock puppets.

Yet somehow this rarely gets focused on.

Allegedly.

(...That's what allegedly means, right? Because that's how you're using it. One doesn't have to dig deep to find all kinds of sexist dirt on the "heroes" of Gamergate, as well as Gamergaters acting like sexist twats, nor does one have to dig deep to find people abusing women and minorities supporting the movement. It's very easy to hate everyone on all sides in this case.)

My point was more that instances of sexism on one-side ring a bit hollow when there is sexism present on the opposition.
Sexism is bad, but it's a smoke screen to the issue.

Allegedly was the wrong word to use, yes. Not sure what I was thinking, my apologies.

Apology accepted, and fair enough.

But my point wasn't "Gamergaters are sexist", just that the whole Gamergate thing has sexism problems. This means on both sides. My original point is that non-stop sexist tropes totally DO affect behaviour in people, and really, pointing out that there's sexism all over the place on both sides regarding Gamergate only reinforces that opinion.

 

[INH5]

Personally, I doubt it. Due to things like confirmation bias, people are quite capable of clinging to their beliefs in the face of overwhelming real world evidence to the contrary. Hence the existence of young-earth creationists. Humans are really, really good at explaining inconvenient facts away to avoid having to change their mind.

So if reality has a really hard time changing people's beliefs and attitudes, why should we expect fiction to be able to mold them like putty? You don't even need to explain away fictional "evidence," you can just tell yourself that the fiction is inaccurate.

Imagine trying this in reverse. What would you expect to happen if you sat a rabid homophobe down to watch an episode of Glee? Would he say, "wow, this TV show about a fictional high school choir has totally convinced me that gay people are okay"? Or would he say "this show sucks because it totally whitewashes the reality of homosexuality"?

Of course, in reality a rabid homophobe is unlikely to ever watch Glee in the first place. That's another thing that gets left out of these debates a lot of the time: people buy and consume the entertainment products that they want to see, and they usually want to see things that agree with their pre-existing values. Hence why there is such a thing as "country music."

There's also the fact that all too often, saying an entertainment product is "sexist" is really just a way of saying that it panders to teenage boys. But why is that inherently sexist or immoral? The Twilight movies are every bit as blatant in their pandering to teenage girls through things like constantly-shirtless-Jacob and his pack of constantly-shirtless-werewolves, but I don't recall anyone ever saying that those movies were "sexist against men" because they treated the male characters as "sex objects." Oh, people called those movies sexist and immoral for a whole bunch of other reasons, but I'm pretty sure that no one ever said that Taylor Lautner's abs were corrupting the minds of our young women.

You could say the same thing about romance novels.

Quite a lot of times, discussions of "sexism in the media," and especially "sexual objectification in the media" feel uncomfortably puritanical to me. Shaming people for their sexuality isn't cool, no matter who your target is.

Don't get me wrong, gratuitous sexual content can definitely harm the quality of a work, often by making it difficult to take seriously (there's a reason that porn isn't known for thrilling stories and compelling characters). Also, narrowly pandering to a particular demographic can absolutely alienate other demographics and narrow a product's appeal. But I take issue with the idea that it is inherently bad or immoral, in the absence of any convincing empirical evidence that it really is harmful.

 

[Riotguards]

well apparently if i can be influenced by sexist behavior in games then i can also be influenced by murder in games as well since lets face it, whats the difference between fictional sexism and fictional murder?

i could also be influenced by fictional torturing, decapitating and magic in games

the key word of course is "fictional" and a majority of gamer's can discern the difference between fiction and reality but those who can't are the ones who are generally sexist / murderers

by the way i like how its sexist that we consider women weak but then a male protagonist might kill 30 male enemies (with little to no female enemies) or that its generally males who commit atrocities

 

[elvor0]

To put it another way, Coke, for example, spends lots of money on advertising and product placement, to get people to want to drink (and thus buy) more Coke. Watching an ad for Coke won't automatically make you go out and buy Coke. A (successful) ad campaign will result in more people buying Coke, though.

I know it wasn't your point, but I don't know why Coke even bothers to advertise anymore. The brand word Coke is used istead of the word cola, advertising is done for them. Their campaign was successful a loooong time ago. In the words of Rich Hall:

You walk up to a vendor:
You: Can I have a coke please?
Vendor: We only serve Pepsi. Is that ok?
You: Whatever.

 

[Thaluikhain]

well apparently if i can be influenced by sexist behavior in games then i can also be influenced by murder in games as well since lets face it, whats the difference between fictional sexism and fictional murder?

One is easily defined, easy to avoid, and brings severe punishments if convicted.

To put it another way, Coke, for example, spends lots of money on advertising and product placement, to get people to want to drink (and thus buy) more Coke. Watching an ad for Coke won't automatically make you go out and buy Coke. A (successful) ad campaign will result in more people buying Coke, though.

I know it wasn't your point, but I don't know why Coke even bothers to advertise anymore. The brand word Coke is used istead of the word cola, advertising is done for them. Their campaign was successful a loooong time ago. In the words of Rich Hall:

You walk up to a vendor:
You: Can I have a coke please?
Vendor: We only serve Pepsi. Is that ok?
You: Whatever.

If "You" will accept a Pepsi instead of a Coke, though, their brand isn't as strong as it needs to be.

 

[Batou667]

well apparently if i can be influenced by sexist behavior in games then i can also be influenced by murder in games as well since lets face it, whats the difference between fictional sexism and fictional murder?

One is easily defined, easy to avoid, and brings severe punishments if convicted.

I feel that slightly different degrees of scrutiny are being applied here. We're happy to use anecdata like "well, I've played Mortal Kombat since I was 10 and I haven't decapitated anyone yet" as a defence of violence in games, but if somebody stepped up and said "Playing GTA hasn't inspired me to murder any prostitutes lately" the reaction is to tell them to stop being so flippantly literal: the argument goes that sexism in games is harmful because it mirrors, normalises and reinforces sexism in the real world, sexism doesn't need to be an overt act like rape or wife-beating to count, we live in a rape-culture not a murder culture, and so on.

Now, I can't state with any confidence that all those ideas are crap, but there's a definite discrepancy in the way we treat violence in games vs sexism in games and that makes me question the whole process. There certainly seems to be much more confirmation bias at work when scrutinising sexual content in games, almost to the point where the argument is phrased in a "guilty until proven innocent" kind of way. Equivalent arguments made about violence would be thrown out and dismissed as tenuous or gratuitous (although some people are starting to go down that path with very selective arguments about violence against women in games).

It's kind of apples vs oranges, isn't it? Fictional sexism vs fictional murder: sexism is a very broad concept that manifests in subtle ways, murder a very specific and extreme act. For equivalence we'd have to make the argument about fictional violence, or fictional aggression.

But hey, I'd like to ask the people who believe that sexist or sexual content in games does affect the attitudes of the player - what makes you so sure? Is there any evidence?

 

[Thaluikhain]

I feel that slightly different degrees of scrutiny are being applied here. We're happy to use anecdata like "well, I've played Mortal Kombat since I was 10 and I haven't decapitated anyone yet" as a defence of violence in games, but if somebody stepped up and said "Playing GTA hasn't inspired me to murder any prostitutes lately" the reaction is to tell them to stop being so flippantly literal: the argument goes that sexism in games is harmful because it mirrors, normalises and reinforces sexism in the real world, sexism doesn't need to be an overt act like rape or wife-beating to count, we live in a rape-culture not a murder culture, and so on.

Now, I can't state with any confidence that all those ideas are crap, but there's a definite discrepancy in the way we treat violence in games vs sexism in games and that makes me question the whole process. There certainly seems to be much more confirmation bias at work when scrutinising sexual content in games, almost to the point where the argument is phrased in a "guilty until proven innocent" kind of way. Equivalent arguments made about violence would be thrown out and dismissed as tenuous or gratuitous (although some people are starting to go down that path with very selective arguments about violence against women in games).

It's kind of apples vs oranges, isn't it? Fictional sexism vs fictional murder: sexism is a very broad concept that manifests in subtle ways, murder a very specific and extreme act. For equivalence we'd have to make the argument about fictional violence, or fictional aggression.

Well...are there common violent themes in videogames that aren't as extreme as murder? Possibly driving in an aggressive and unsafe manner, I guess.

But hey, I'd like to ask the people who believe that sexist or sexual content in games does affect the attitudes of the player - what makes you so sure? Is there any evidence?

What would constitute evidence, though? Measuring sexism, and things that increase it doesn't seem to be an easy thing to do.

In general, though, I'd say that it seems fairly self-evident that culture and society play a part in people's attitudes to sexism (and more or less everything else), and that videogames are part of that. Now, I couldn't say how much of an effect they have compared to, say, books, film and newspapers.

 

[Riotguards]

One is easily defined, easy to avoid, and brings severe punishments if convicted.

but one actually has more impact than the other one

a slap on the bottom or saying that "women are weak" is nothing compared to shooting a person in the face (aka murder)

why should we treat something that is the worst thing to happen less than something that could be defined as a "mild to high annoyance" sure i get it, sexism isn't good and we should be fighting it but if why are we ignoring something on the scales of David vs Goliath, sexism vs murder although we know that murder WILL win in the battle of the "whats worse"

 

[Thaluikhain]

One is easily defined, easy to avoid, and brings severe punishments if convicted.

but one actually has more impact than the other one

a slap on the bottom or saying that "women are weak" is nothing compared to shooting a person in the face (aka murder)

why should we treat something that is the worst thing to happen less than something that could be defined as a "mild to high annoyance" sure i get it, sexism isn't good and we should be fighting it but if why are we ignoring something on the scales of David vs Goliath, sexism vs murder although we know that murder WILL win in the battle of the "whats worse"

An individual instance of murder is going to be worse than an individual instance of sexism (unless that happens to be particularly nasty), sure, but murders are comparatively rare, sexism isn't.

More importantly, though, why must we ignore murder, or anything else, in order to care about sexism? There's no reason why people can't care about more than one thing.

 

[Batou667]

Well...are there common violent themes in videogames that aren't as extreme as murder? Possibly driving in an aggressive and unsafe manner, I guess.

Most games have themes of aggression and conflict, even if they never actually culminate in graphic depictions of people being murdered. Action, shooter and RPG games all contain killing as a standard mechanic, but even sports games usually include aggressive driving or brash physicality on a court or pitch, fighting games revolve around knocking your opponent unconscious, strategy games frequently involve the simulated destruction of armies or entire civilisations, and so on.

If we wanted to "do a Jack Thompson" and invoke the same kind of arguments that people do when attacking sex in games, we could make a case for 99% of games glorifying, trivialising, normalising, contributing to, or at the very least not challenging aggression, violence, conflict and bloodshed in every aspect of society from interpersonal relations right up to global warfare. We could dredge up emotive stories of kids accidentally killing themselves attempting WWE moves, statistics about gun and knife crime, photos of the civilians killed in warfare and genocides - and then make loaded statements like "So, does society have a problem with violence or not, hmm? Are you sure depictions of violence in media don't contribute to this?"

Now, my position is that this is faulty reasoning. It's begging the question. It's also severely fudging causality (what accounted for all the warfare and violent crime before video games?) and isn't supported by violent crime trends (all types of violent crime have been steadily falling since the early 90s, and murder in particular is down to the same level it was in 1970 - so much for the "never had it worse" fallacies).

If this kind of cherry-picking analysis of violence in games is unsatisfactory, why are we (collectively) so receptive to ideas about sex in games?

What would constitute evidence, though? Measuring sexism, and things that increase it doesn't seem to be an easy thing to do.

In general, though, I'd say that it seems fairly self-evident that culture and society play a part in people's attitudes to sexism (and more or less everything else), and that videogames are part of that. Now, I couldn't say how much of an effect they have compared to, say, books, film and newspapers.

How could we quantify sexism? Well, I agree it would be very tricky indeed to make concrete links between media and real life, but we could look at things like government policies and equality laws, demographics in education and work, statistics for spousal abuse, rape rates, and so on.

People are pretty egocentric, we're all susceptible to nostalgia and viewing the past through rose-tinted glasses, and it seems we have a kind of fatalism or "never had it worse" mentality hardwired into our collective consciousness, so I'd be VERY cagey about accepting any premise based on so-called self-evidence, especially when the actual statistics so often run counter to commonly-held beliefs and folk wisdom. See the violent crime trends I linked above, and also the US rape statistics (note the same localised peak in the early 90s and a steady drop ever since) - although an issue might seem to be a crisis due to media exposure and being a contemporary hot-button topic, the truth of the matter may be very different.

All the statistics I've seen indicate that Western society is the most peaceful and female-safe area of the planet, and looking back at history, furthermore we're enjoying a period of time that's more gender-equal and less dangerous than our parents experienced. So, any arguments that are based on doomsaying or the notion that we're at a crisis point strike me as very myopic, if not intentionally misleading. Besides, haven't we heard all these arguments before? Comic books were going to be the death of literacy, rock and roll was supposed to produce a deadbeat generation devoid of morals, video nasties were going to desensitise our kids into nihilistic sadists. It's a very, very familiar cycle of a new type of media being blamed for the social grumble du jour, and, like all of the above, I strongly suspect that concerns about video games (in terms of both violence and sexism) will turn out to be completely unfounded.

 

[INH5]

A question for the pro-influence people: why hasn't Ms. Sarkeesian herself been affected by sexism in video games? After all, she has played or at least watched LP footage of hundreds of hours of the very worst material that games have to offer. Yet it doesn't seem to have altered her attitudes one bit.

That's the weird thing about controversies like this: the critics are always inexplicably immune to the dangers that they want to protect everyone else from. I suppose that makes some sort of sense if you're trying to protect children (see Fredric Wertham), but the games in question here are usually rated M.

 

[Thaluikhain]

So, any arguments that are based on doomsaying or the notion that we're at a crisis point strike me as very myopic, if not intentionally misleading. Besides, haven't we heard all these arguments before? Comic books were going to be the death of literacy, rock and roll was supposed to produce a deadbeat generation devoid of morals, video nasties were going to desensitise our kids into nihilistic sadists. It's a very, very familiar cycle of a new type of media being blamed for the social grumble du jour, and, like all of the above, I strongly suspect that concerns about video games (in terms of both violence and sexism) will turn out to be completely unfounded.

I'm not seeing anyone (at least here) make this argument. There's a big jump from "videogames have an effect" to "videogames will kill us all".

Certainly, society isn't about to fall apart due to pinball machines or whatever, but that's not to say we shouldn't keep an eye on things that could cause problems.

All the statistics I've seen indicate that Western society is the most peaceful and female-safe area of the planet, and looking back at history, furthermore we're enjoying a period of time that's more gender-equal and less dangerous than our parents experienced.

Would you agree that this is due, at least in parts, to the current culture and society in place? That is, culture and society play a part in issues such as violence and sexism? And that videogames are part of this culture?

...

Bit of a tangent, but it struck me that people seem to be working from the assumption that there is a consensus that aggression and violence is something we shouldn't be encouraging. Senseless aggression could be argued to be a virtue, at least in men.