Kickstarter Video Project Attracts Misogynist Horde

[The Great JT]

Misogyny still exists? I thought we had moved on from this by now.

To Ms. or Mrs. (I don't know which) Sarkeesian, I say keep up the good fight.
To the horde of misogynists that posted against Sarkeesian, I say, "go fuck your collective selves."

 

[Elate]

In games where women are objectified, so are men. Shocking revelation.

In games where men aren't Mr manly man, or some other extreme end of the spectrum of manliness, neither are women.

I must be some super intelligent hyper being, since nobody seems able to make that connection, at all.

So, sure, she can label the whole gaming community as a bunch of misogynistic pigs, who treat women as objects, so long as I can label the whole feminist community as a bunch of whining women, who want to be treated above, and not equal to everyone else, because they're women.

Edit: why does she even require this money? Just looking at the examples she has etc, these things have really low production value, and she already has the equipment.. So, what is the point of this kickstarter?

 

[Eamar]

So... nothing new here. Love that people immediately started defending this in one way or another.

Aaaand cue the people defending this sort of shit.

This stuff happens all the time in the gaming community and it needs to be pointed out and heckled as much as possible.

Hopefully, the gaming community will be dragged kicking and screaming towards a point where this kind of crap is at least frowned upon. (But I am sure I will be called `extreme` for even thinking there is a problem).

Another "extremist" here. You said everything I wanted to, cheers.

 

[loc978]

I actually like the idea behind this woman's ideas, not only as something that addresses subject matter that needs to be addressed, but as a starting point for larger discussions about all stereotypes.

As for the internet hate machine... it's a youtube video [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sDbHwz6JGzo].

 

[Kahunaburger]

snip

$6000 was the funding goal, and is pretty normal cost-wise for a video series of FF's production quality. The fact that the kickstarter made 10x that amount:

A) indicates that the community apparently does not think we've reached the saturation point for incisive criticism of sexism in game design.

B) should not lead to assumptions that the money will be spent unwisely. There's nothing that supports the "ZOMG Anita Sarkeesian will pocket the money!1!!!" conclusion some folks seem to be jumping to.

Considering that it is obvious she already has the gear to do the videos, the only expense there is is the expense of, "Well, I'm taking up my free time to make these videos about old news, are you going to pay me for it?"

There are plenty of people out there that make videos of better quality and actually bring interesting new points about what they are discussing, and they do it for free.

If she needs money to live on, she can go do something that is actually new and constructive, find somebody to actually hire her on whatever talents she has.

A.) As I said, naive people in the community. If saturation of the exact same thing and message over and over again truly worked, nobody would be smoking cigarettes and those companies would have been put out of business.

B.) If she spends it on herself in any way, she is spending it unwisely and she has taken advantage of said naive people.

Once again, there isn't any actual evidence to support the conclusions you are jumping to. Out of curiosity, on a scale of 1-10 (1 being "strongly disagree" and 10 being "agree,") where do you fall re: Feminist Frequency videos?

 

[NiPah]

Oh hey I never heard about this person, I'll have to watch some of her vids.
I'm also quite interested in her take on video games, even though I hate people explaining tropes (which in the end means I start to see them everywhere and can't enjoy my good old mindless shows).

 

[ThePenguinKnight]

I'm curious as to why she needs money to make a Youtube video. Is she banned from using Google or something? The video's going to contain what? Knowledge that we are already aware of?

 

[Denamic]

Her entire video reeks of confirmation bias.
Like using Batman: Arkham City as an example of sexism because of Catwoman being overly feminine while wearing a skintight suit, completely ignoring Batman being overly masculine while also wearing a skintight suit.
I'm a feminist myself, as in for equality between the sexes. But this shit isn't really helping.
She's preaching a flawed message to the choir, while non-choir people get angry.
It's lose-lose.

 

[Prosis]

I don't know much about documentaries.

But regardless of the content, isn't this much money excessive? I mean, for documentaries on drugs, hate crime, or politics, the money is needed. It is spent on travel, camera crews, airing time, editing, and (biggest of all) landing interviews with doctors, officials, and other "big name" people.

For a documentary about sexism in video games, I'm really not sure where the money would be spent. Most things related to games can be found online. I guess you could interview some psychologists and some big name game executives (although I doubt they'd be caught dead in such an interview). Which may call for travel?

I watched some of her other videos. It really doesn't seem to be anything more than just a few days worth of editing and googling. Nothing worth thousands of dollars.

I'm not knocking the content. I'm questioning whether the money is really going into the documentary, or into somebody's pocket or website. This is a concern I have for many kickstarters, but for the documentaries it seems to be an especially valid concern.

 

[Eamar]

If the way women are portrayed in Games didn't appeal to the demographic (sorry ladies, you aren't the demographic, buy more games and maybe that will change) why on earth would they design it that way?

Going to quote myself from my previous post:
"by unnecessarily catering to an audience they already have, the industry is both discouraging women from playing `our´ games and sending a message about the female sex to their players."

The issue is decades old. Women, and girls, have been discouraged from getting involved with technology/electronics, and as such didn't have much presence when video games became a thing. Then, while the market has started to appeal to the female gender with other forms of consumer electronics and entertainment, the video game industry has largely stubbornly been minmaxing its gender appeal stats.

You're not going to get someone to buy more games if you're unnecessarily making games unappealing to that someone.

Hot damn, you just refuted your own point for me. Thanks


They already have a audience, why would they go out of their way to obtain a audience they have no guarentee to obtain when that might alienate the one they already have? They don't have a reason.

Wow, just... wow. You're saying that including some female characters who aren't sexist stereotypes might alienate the existing audience? I think a large number of male gamers might want a word with you if that's your honest opinion of them.

 

[Moonlight Butterfly]

Aaaand cue the people defending this sort of shit.

This stuff happens all the time in the gaming community and it needs to be pointed out and heckled as much as possible.

Hopefully, the gaming community will be dragged kicking and screaming towards a point where this kind of crap is at least frowned upon. (But I am sure I will be called `extreme` for even thinking there is a problem).

Just what I was thinking. I came into the comments expecting people to be disgusted but the first few pages are people defending the hecklers...sigh.

It seems like a few people need to know the difference between a power fantasy and a sexual fantasy. Male characters are power fantasy and are designed to appeal to men not women.

Also arguing that the demographic makes it alright is abhorrent. You wouldn't say racism is alright if the majority of the audience were white people so why is sexism okay?

 

[Sonic Doctor]

snip

Once again, there isn't any actual evidence to support the conclusions you are jumping to. Out of curiosity, on a scale of 1-10 (1 being "strongly disagree" and 10 being "agree,") where do you fall re: Feminist Frequency videos?

Five. There have always bee things when it comes to feminism that I think are a good point, and things I think are just overreactions.

But the discussion is about such things in video games.

I really don't see over-sexualized females in games as problem, it is just marketing to a real demographic. The problem is that there aren't a lot of normal, down to earth stylizations of women in games, but I'm not going to take someone seriously if they say there aren't any, or that the ones there are aren't to exact prefect standards for a proper representation of women(because, having encountered many everyday women, there really is no exact perfect representation, or ones that will be admitted to).

 

[Lurklen]

I really don't get what there is to be upset about. I mean she's just making some videos about gender in video games, hasn't the Extra Credits team done that dozens of times? I'm not sure why that merits a kickstarter but if people are willing to give their money to it that's their business.

People need to relax and stop being dicks on the internet.

 

[Kuth]

snip

Once again, there isn't any actual evidence to support the conclusions you are jumping to. Out of curiosity, on a scale of 1-10 (1 being "strongly disagree" and 10 being "agree,") where do you fall re: Feminist Frequency videos?

Five. There have always bee things when it comes to feminism that I think are a good point, and things I think are just overreactions.

But the discussion is about such things in video games.

I really don't see over-sexualized females in games as problem, it is just marketing to a real demographic. The problem is that there aren't a lot of normal, down to earth stylizations of women in games, but I'm not going to take someone seriously if they say there aren't any, or that the ones there are aren't to exact prefect standards for a proper representation of women(because, having encountered many everyday women, there really is no exact perfect representation, or ones that will be admitted to).

I think that's where much of the hatred come from. You first have the Feminist right on the channel, and a lot of men have stgymitized Femenist=Anti-men. It's not true that all Feminist are anti-male, but there have been enough loud women to make a trope of it.

The second I feel is that a lot of these men feel threatened that their supply of eyecandy is going to be cut off. Any form of change like that, and a lot of boys are going to get pissed. I'm more concerned is what part of males are doing this?

Extreme Anti-Feminist for certain. But Traditionalist would not be against such a move. I'm thinking it may just be douchebags, and sadly enough of them to make a horde. It's good to ignore douchebags, it's bad to ignore it when there are enough of them on the same wave length.

 

[Rakor]

Dang, popular topic, eh?

Hmmm, I may throw a tad more than just a small hissy fit if I actually watch that entire video. Love how she's trying to talk about women stereotypes and such with big hoop earrings and green fingernails, just noticing.

That is probably one of the most nonsensical things I've read recently.
What strangled thread of logic links those things together?

The most nonsensical? You don't read very interesting things then. I do tend to ramble from one point to the next a bit too easily admittedly.

Well, firstly the fingernails and hoop earrings aren't the major reason for potential hissy fitting. They just seem to stick out somehow and are kinda prime examples of stuff that are in line with the feminine stereotype. Not saying makeup and jewelry are bad, just the large earrings and frikkin green fingernails are not particularly subtle. Maybe I rather dislike oddly colored fingernails, hmm. Really kind of a minor jab I had about it.

I can sort of perhaps see that but not really.
Just because you're against stereotyping and lazy tropes in games doesn't mean you have to be like: `People want women to be pretty?! FUCK THAT I WILL COVER MYSELF IN SHIT!`.

Reminds me of the time some guy tried to tell me I couldn't be a feminist and wear heels.

Whoa, simmer down Nancy. It just kind of sticks out a bit especially when there's a closeup on the controller. I apparently also find the fingernails a bit gaudy, I guess. Now, as all you've done is mock a side point I made, I don't know which side of the fence you are on in this issue. But, you are making the assertion that the existence of elements of a stereotype does not proclaim acceptance of said stereotype. So what's wrong with video game characters exhibiting them. Princess Peach is not a portrayal of women, she is a portrayal of one fictional woman, named Princess Peach. Why is it an issue that she wears heels (among other things but you get what I mean).

I am putting far more thought into this thread than I expected to.

I mean really my offense to this whole deal is her convincing people to give her $49,000 to rant about caricatures.

And another thing, why is someone a feminist and not a humanist if they want equality.

Now, just to be clear, I did not go off on a tangent directed at my quotee. Just stemmed off to a tangent from her point. I tend to do that.

 

[Eamar]

Wow, just... wow. You're saying that including some female characters who aren't sexist stereotypes might alienate the existing audience? I think a large number of male gamers might want a word with you if that's your honest opinion of them.

You mean the one's that pretend it isn't so? I think I can cope. I've yet to hear back from the guy stating that the risk totally isn't there on why they wouldn't already be doing it.

I have the good fortune of being friends IRL with plenty of male gamers who don't think this way. By which I mean sure, they enjoy the odd bit of eye candy (as do I, I am by no means saying there's no place for that, please don't get me wrong), but they are also capable of functioning in society without reducing every female to a sex object. They don't run screaming from a game, film or book because they felt alienated by a believable female character, or because there aren't enough boobs.

If you honestly think like that then you sir sound either very young, very inexperienced, or just plain misanthropic. Sorry, but that's how it comes across.

Also, I've also yet to hear a description of what constitutes this non-stereotypical female character, go ahead, give it a shot, I'm seriously interested in how many people will agree with you.

A few examples already exist, we'd just like to see more of them. Alyx Vance (Half-Life 2), original Samus (Metroid series), Kat (Halo Reach), Wynne (DA:O. Bonus points for also being an exceptionally rare example of an older woman who's not just a background NPC). That's about all I've got, but there's some variety in there. A case could be made for FemShep since she's whatever you want her to be and they don't add in any obnoxious "girly" stuff for her.

 

[acosn]

1: It makes no sense that in a medium that is absolutely chock full of projects that ask for zero funding yet deliver similar products, someone asks for money to produce their show.

2: It's not misogyny, it's the typical internet response to anything they don't like. They will literally grab onto anything. It doesn't help that she manages to contradict herself repeatedly. And there's the part of intellectual property theft. Sorry, but Photoshopping the head off one character and placing it on a torso from that same IP is still IP theft. It's also actually favoring a character trope that she herself said was bad- the female that's really just a man with boobs and different plumbing.

3: She's actually sexist herself. Yes, women are shoved into caricatures in video games. As are men. Granted, there's room for both to move around, but you find it in every medium that when content creators try to build product for a mainstream audience they have to use very narrow character tropes. Video games introduced the silent protagonist, but even then there's a very narrow set of expectations. We can call it the Link or Gordon Freeman effect.

 

[ExileNZ]

You know, I seriously hope a chunk of the money pledged came as a direct or indirect result of the fame of those dumb bastards' flaming. Just unbelievable.