Gamestation Defends "Sexist" Ad

[Lissa-QUON]

Oh good lord. I'm baffled how anyone can read this as "it's saying girls are expensive and the game is cheap." Not that that reading is less sexist or stereotypical.

SNIP

Too bad the ad actually reads "Cheaper than your girlfriend", not "Even cheaper than your girlfriend". Troll fail?

Nope not troll fail, reading comprehension fail. Got so far in the comments before posting that I didn't look at the ad again and somehow the phrase in my head got changed to "even cheaper."

Still the argument still carries regardless of the lack the "even" in the phrase. Theres still a build up of "cheap" and "cheaper"

 

[tehweave]

ITT: Males defending their peni.

Also this:


From what it seems like, this is rather sexist, but then again, the majority of gamers are men, and I'm betting the percentage of females who play call of duty is somewhere within the 10% range... So can we let a major retailer get away with sexism if it doesn't affect women, but instead appeals to the 13-25 year old non-girlfriend-having gamer stereotype?

What's the answer here?

 

[Technicka]

This advert has been up for ages, I mean at least a year or so, around Gamestation stores and indeed the country and this is the first, I repeat, FIRST time I've heard a complaint about it. But of course it doesn't matter, one woman working at one store totally misunderstood the advertisement and now it will probably be ripped down.

I could go on about how men are blatantly ridiculed, called stupid, useless, slow, dangerous, reckless, uncaring etc in advertising and is allowed without complaint but I know it is a lost cause. No one cares. The issue here is that a woman has taken offense at a little "aren't girlfriends expensive?" joke (which in my experience yes, yes they bloody well are) and if you don't agree with her then you're "obviously" a dirty, evil, nasty sexist and you're keeping women down EVERYWHERE.

There's only a few things I can really do here, keep my head down, don't bother trying to debate with the unreasoning horde (yes unreasoning, if you can't even try to see the other side of an argument your just as bull headed as any sexist) and of course, try to skip all the ads you see.

False equivalence, we meet again!

Instances of men being portrayed as buffoons aren't in the same boat. Why? Because males still hold the power within society. Not to mention that those men, often shown to be less than a prime catch, still always manage to find a woman that's out of their league, and willing to indulge the men's shortcomings. It's (typically) men making fun of men. That's akin to trying to argue reverse racism if a movie features a kick-ass minority character, and a bumbling white sidekick.


It's easy to accuse the complaining employee of being overly sensitive. Especially if you've never had to deal with the levels of shit being a girl in gaming brings. It gets worse if you work in a store. If you're lucky, you'll only get the "I didn't figure chicks liked this... Cool.". The industry operates on the mentality of "White Straight Male" for their default in a lot of things. And, people who don't fit that criteria (or are bored of seeing it) are starting to speak up about it. Because, at the end of the day, sexism is a big issue with the gaming culture. This ad is just an small example of the pervasive mindset going on.

 

[sdafdfhrye3245]

I don't see how that is sexist.

 

[viking97]

o for fucks sake-

its a joke in poor taste, that is all

 

[Canid117]

While it is stupid at least it is funnier than all the stuff EA's marketing team has been pumping out recently.

 

[Seives-Sliver]

I giggled at it, yes it's sexist, but it's still funny to me >.>

 

[soulfire130]

-_- *signs* Why, gamestation? Did you not know the storm of crap you were about to stur up?


OT: It a generalization of girlfriends that they constantly spend money on shoes, clothes and jewlery. Like Duke Nuke 'em forever, It IS NOT supposed to be taken seriously.
Really, now.

 

[caviar1]

so girls are expensive? thats hardly better than "girls are cheap", i would love to see Extra Credits or Moviebob tear into this ad, theyre just trying to be funny in the way they think their audience will appreciate. That they think their audience is appreciative of sexism is an insult to gamers, women and female gamers. Permit me to get up on my soapbox and say that while the advertisement isnt jaw-droppingly ignorant, it does perpetuate cultural stereotypes and outdated ways of thinking, things that i would prefer not to be lumped in with as a "gamer"

 

[spartan773]

this may be rude and all... but i level with that... what i'm going to say is not sexist or anything... i'd just rather fork out the 60 bucks for a decent game and get several thousand hours of enjoyment and satisfaction than to fork out 30 bucks for dinner for a 45-minute date and get dumped for a minor shitty detail.

 

[XxSummonerxX]

I am a bad bad person because I giggled.

I am also a bad person.

If you are bad people for giggling, I am the most evil person on the entire planet for laughing so hard I doubled over, followed by sharing it on facebook, and making it my avatar on steam.

 

[Bocaj2000]

Guys, something CAN be funny and insulting at the same time. Yes, the ad is kind of funny, but it is insulting and almost offensive to me AS A GAMER by reinforcing the negative stereotype of being a socially awkward shut-in whose best friend is a computer.

 

[MB202]

Oh that's just terrible. "Cheaper than your girlfriend"... Geez, even they they're deliberately trying to be "edgy", that doesn't mean they're not wrong for doing it.

 

[Therumancer]

Meh, seems like someone trying to grab five minutes of relative fame for making a complaint. That's no worse than advertising aimed at women that present men as morons who are incapable of taking care of themselves or whatever.

I wouldn't quite give it the whole "Chicks Eh?" thing, even jokingly, since I doubt she even seriously believes what she's saying here. It's just too ridiculous.

One of these days I would like to see some troll actually get somewhere by complaining about how he feels offended as a man due to some piece of girl-centric advertising at some point.

Honestly though I'd really just like people to stop all the gender-warfare/one upsmanship crud so more energy can be expended where it matters. It's just one of those things that increasingly bothers me with everything else going on out there. If you want to stand up for women's rights, then look to where there are problems like The Middle East, as hard as that is, not some tongue in cheek ad at a bloody game store.

 

[GuerrillaClock]

Either way I don't really find this offensive. It's either "hurhur, your girlfriend is cheap", basically turning it into a "yo momma" joke, or, more likely, it's saying, in a tongue in cheek fashion or more likely, "don't take your girlfriend out to dinner, stay in and play this game instead". Given how many guys probably spent time away from their girlfriends when CoD came out, it's just kind of a running joke. Not an amazing one, but most ads aren't that funny anyway.

In no sense would it mean "GIRLS ARE CHEAP". So no, it's in no way "openly sexist" or discriminatory.

Edit: It's also not insulting to me as a gamer, because why would it be? You're meant to go "Heh, I'd totally ditch my gf for that and be a manly mannish man shooting things" AS A JOKE. IT'S TONGUE IN CHEEK. Some people need to grow thicker skin, methinks. No one's seriously going to think better or worse of gamers OR women because of this because it's a fucking ad. I'm not going to go and buy CoD and tell my girlfriend to stay in the kitchen because I saw it. Hell, I'm not even gonna go buy CoD because of it.

 

[TheAbominableDan]

I find this offensive. It is pretty sexist. I have a few problems with it. First of all when you say something is cheaper than something it's always a cheap thing. You never see an advertisement that says something like "Cheaper than the International Space Station" so there is the implication that your girlfriend is cheap.

There's also the old stereotype that's always bugged me that women are both expensive, and also the way to keep a woman is to constantly spend money on her. People are going to respond to me by saying "But that's true" well maybe, if you base your world view on stand-up comedians instead of actual dating experience. If you don't then it's only sometimes true. It's possible to have a relationship where you don't spend tons of money all the time.

In summary, ad is indeed offensive.

 

[Furrama]

This ad is very sexist. I'm a girl that plays games and I can say without any sarcasm that I am indeed offended. I'll not shop there, that's for sure.

 

[Clockwork-Fox]

It makes male gamers look worse actually. It better works to fulfill the stereotypes about male gamers who would rather buy a game than take their girlfriends on a date because it might be cheaper. But since I'm a girl and in school for design, I just find it stupid. Not offensive so much as just bad and tasteless. If I was art director at the ad agency who put this out, I'd fire myself. It's not an effective ad for the commotion it caused, nor is it even clever. It buys in on old, abused stereotypes, with most people either rolling their eyes, giggling but not considering buying the product, or makes them angry and refusing to buy it. Advertising fail.

 

[Revolutionary]

Nearly shat myself laughing, then Realised that I actually have a girlfriend at this point in time (I'm still getting used to it) and then I felt depressed.

 

[pulse2]

It doesnt mean that the girlfriend is cheap, actually it means that she is expensive and going with games instead of girls is cheaper.

Need I say any more, to which they would be correct, and you'd get a hell of a lot less grief too. Call of duty: Black ops doesn't get jealous when I look at other games, it knows it is the best