hermes200 said:
I am not sure why so many critics have recently addressed the issue of politics in media, but since he put it a lot better than me, I will leave this here:
Hasn't this been a trend for quite some time? I think people are trying to make a return to the jaded cynicism of the 90s.
Repeat after me: "whatever, man."
But slightly less flippantly, there has been a huge politicisation of things in recent years. A backlash against that is sort of expected. That's not to say I disagree with ES, but people tend to get fed up with almost anythin g that lasts for more than five minutes.
And wandering into the ES video for a moment, it's freaking absurd that games like GTA V, which are supposedly all satire and social commentary, are being treated by so many as though they are above criticism. And as though people bringing up the politics of the gmes are the ones bringing politics into it.
Sean951 said:
Or Wikileaks/Assange isn't as benign or helpful as you would like to think.
They don't need to be benign or helpful at all for RP's statement about something being up to be accurate, so that's not it.
Dunesen said:
I think the apparent rise of discussion of politics in media is a result of the recent rise of hyper-partisanship and the transformation of everything into a political football. While partisanship has always been a thing, there used to be far more topics and subjects that weren't treated as a 'liberal vs. conservative' or 'Democrat vs. Republican' issue. For example, prior to the Obamas moving into the White House the First Lady would traditionally have a pet cause she would advocate, something apolitical like combatting illiteracy or drug use. Michelle Obama chose childhood obesity, and Sarah Palin and others reacted to this [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SaUmOAlz6Zw] as if she was calling for the government to step in and control everyone's eating habits.
And partisanship has impacted specifically consumerism for quite some time now. Even if games are a product and nothing more, products have been politicised and made partisan quite often in our recent history. The car you drive, the food you eat, the beer you drink, the the places you frequent.
Aardvaarkman said:
That seems unlikely to me, as the people who seriously address politics in games tend to come at it from a very moderate and considered viewpoint, such as Bob in this article, and the Errant Signal video linked here.
People who seriously address politics in games are few and far between, though. Also, both Bob and ES are accused of being TEH BIAS by the more common variety.
It actually seems to be the people who object to the discussion of politics in games who are the most partisan, but they seem to lack the self-awareness to realize this. Just look at all the guys who scream "political correctness" and get hyper combative when the subject of gender in games come up. As the Errant Signal video says - they think they are being apolitical, and just saying "that's the way the world naturally is" - when they are actually arguing from a very skewed worldview.
In short, I think it's the biggest partisans who want to shut down any discussion of politics in games.
Well, yes and no. The partisans you reference tend to want to shut down one side of the discussion. Continuing the example you were on, they want to keep talking about the sex/gender issues in GTA. They just don't want it criticised. Fox News--quick to politicise anything that fits their narrative, true or not--frequently chastises others for injecting politics into things when they don't agree. Are they not self-aware? I think they are quite self-aware. Calling "bias" and calling for false neutrality have become easy ways to dodge criticism of any sort.
More importantly, though, the moderates tend to get shouted down. It's hard to have a serious discussion of the political/social/whatever elements of games because SHOUTING IS WINNING even off the internet. On the internet, it's worse, because people will make death threats, call you a ******, or spam your channel. A week or two ago, someone made a fresh account just to give MovieBob shit, and it's kind of weird to me because it wasn't long before that that I was basically accused of hating MB's videos because I was critical of one or two elements. I'm a hater, and Bob is some militant radical, evidently.
To borrow a phrase, "this is why we can't have nice things.
