Kickstarter Video Project Attracts Misogynist Horde

[Zer_]

I'd say it's working perfectly.

She's already gone from "Who's that *****?" to "Oh, that *****."

If the aim of the outrage was to prove that the gaming community doesn't have a lingering problem with women, well ... good job, guys.

I'd say it's more a problem with her one-sided approach that rails against video-game women conforming to stereotypes, while completely ignoring that video-game men conform to stereotypes just as much. And the fact that she's crowdsourcing videos, videos just like the one she made to advertise her solicitations, videos she'll make even more money on the ad revenue and traffic they'll generate.

But, by all means, let's pay $50 so she can tell us we're all pigs for playing Super Mario Brothers, which has a princess who needs rescuing.

While I agree with your message in general, I think you're painting her more as a feminazi.

 

[Kahunaburger]

Yahtzee was offered money to do what he does after he created videos that were interesting and new-for free.

Which is exactly what happened with this kickstarter, as well. People wouldn't be throwing $70,000 dollars at this documentary if FF hadn't built up credibility.

No, people wouldn't be throwing $70k at this documentary if there hadn't been as much publicity about the negative comments she was receiving about it. I doubt most of the people who threw money at her had even HEARD of her blog before.

No, FF is pretty well-known. It's well-done, high production value online criticism with some pretty good social media support. I've linked to it, I've been linked to it. The kickstarter hit the budget goal less than 24 hours after it was posted.

 

[Angryman101]

Yahtzee was offered money to do what he does after he created videos that were interesting and new-for free.

Which is exactly what happened with this kickstarter, as well. People wouldn't be throwing $70,000 dollars at this documentary if FF hadn't built up credibility.

Do you honestly believe that that many people have heard of this chick before this? No. I checked her series, she averaged around 60-70k hits as far as I could tell. Nowhere near enough exposure to draw this kind of backing. This money isn't a representation of her skills, this money is in response to the content. Feminists want their views validated, and want to spite those who they feel are repressing them.

 

[Khazoth]

Neither of those series required +6,000. Penny Arcade simply required a website and a loose definition of the word 'talent.'

Remember the Extra Credits/Escapist controversy? Particularly the part that related to the money due to EC (considerably more than $6,000) that hadn't been paid to them?

And Yahtzee? He made two of these videos before being picked up by the escapist when he was, as he describes, poor.

And I'm sure he'd totally be able to make them at the current rate and production value if he wasn't compensated.

There is a difference between a webseries that COSTS money to create and a webseries that GENERATES money and expands into different territory.

What does that even mean?

Well, let me start with number one, no, I don't. I don't remember because I never cared for Extra Credits, no offense to that lot but I never started watching their videos.

Number two, Yeah, yeah he would, go look at youtube, any part of it. No offense to Yahtzee but you can make his show with the simplest of video editing software, and that was his intention I believe. The problem is, Yahtzee was discovered for his talent, he was picked up and asked to join, he didn't ask for money.

Number 3. It means that your examples didnt cost six thousand to begin, no where near that much. I doubt it costed more then a hundred dollars. It GENERATED and EARNED money and then expanded into different territory like games for Penny Arcade, or merchandising for Yahtzee.

 

[GLo Jones]

I really don't fucking get it. Granted, the response has been shameful. But... doesn't she put out videos on youtube about this very sort of thing?

Why is she now making a kickstarter to fund what she's been doing for ages already? Why has she been promised $73,000?

Maybe I should let Tobuscus or RayWilliamJohnson know of this little financial trick.

Edit: Just looked at some of the posts above, I may be stepping into a minefield with this one.

 

[Angryman101]

Hahahaha, careful, missy, your mad is showing. Nice job turning to ad hominem when you couldn't rebuff my points.

1: Not a girl.
2: Not mad, only tired.
3: I failed to see any points I couldn't rebuff by pointing out that you still fail to give me actual examples of the thousands (by now hundresds if I've not misread) webseries covering the same topic as she wants to cover.

You already saw the examples when you looked it up yourself. The other guy I quoted also posted examples. You're either willfully ignoring them or we are just not on the same wavelength.

 

[Professor James]

A bit off topic but can someone tell me why people are using judaism as a derogatory term?

 

[Khazoth]

snip

So, I watched now through most of them and none of them actually discusses the topic you can expect from this series (again, I base my argumentation on her already existing series: Tropes vs Women).

The topic won't be obejctifying women (well, not in that extent) or being sexist to other players. What will be discussed is how female characters in fall into certain roles in the story and fail to be actual female characters. Some of the tropes (I think you know the definition of it) can be looked up, some are rather specific and I failed to find any information on it on the site Angryman101 suggested. Basically: This series won't deal that much with depiction of females or the harassment of players but more how female characters are used in games.

Add to this: In comparison to the first series she not only wants to increase the duration (doubling it) but also add examples which avoid it (and really, those are even rare in movies which are more sophisticated than games).

A little sidenote: Of all the videos you linked only one came close to the same level of quality in sound and video.

6k... reasonable sum. Like I already wrote: I hope she'll answer me roughtly in what she wants to invest the 70k.

They might not be what she intends to cover, but that was a handful out of a couple thousand videos I didnt care to take the time to link.

The point is that the subject matter has been covered so many times people are tired of hearing it.

"We're men, we're horrible sexist people, yeah we get it can we stop taking about this subject now?"

 

[Adam Jensen_v1legacy]

Wait a minute. She asked for money in order to make 5 videos? 5 videos about a subject everyone who's interested in is already familiar with? Subject already researched and analyzed by many other serious video game journalists?

AND PEOPLE FELL FOR THAT?!

I have to say I am impressed. Well done. She made people pay for something completely useless. She should be in politics.

 

[Furrama]

So, you're shaming her because you don't think she deserves anything, that the discussion has been had and that everything is over. Are things... better though after said discussion?

The discussion will be had again and again, and the same general points made over and over, with better and better quality, until things change. That's how change works. Very rarely do I hear someone make an original point never thought of before. Martin Luther King Jr. wasn't the first nor the last to talk about the issues surrounding race in America. Things are better than they were, but things are not where they could be, should be.

People donating, for the most part, have no ill feelings toward the things that are men. There are men donating after all, many women are married to them, have them as sons, so forth. People do have ill feelings to what they perceive as jerkbacks. That I can abide. The money has ceased to become mere funding and has become a statement: "Jerkbags. No. Stop it. We're tired of your crap."

I'm shaming her because she is making money off of this for not doing anything new or interesting. She's getting money because 'feminism, yay!'
I don't give a shit about 'jerkbags', as you so eloquently put it. And comparing some shitty writing and side boob exposure to the civil rights movement is pretty god damn blasphemous.

Side boob exposure? You made that blasphemous link, not me.

Look at women's issues of today. Look at yesteryear. Things are better. Look at civil rights issues for African-Americans of today and yesteryear. Better. But still broken when compared to the rights and privileges to men in America and Japan, the places where games are made. Sure, everyone has their kicks, but their kicks don't really limit them in such a drastic way.

 

[Scars Unseen]

To be fair, your sentiment is countered by three things:

1) The same could be said of (nearly) every other project on Kickstarter. People tend to start small and, if they're very very lucky, bring in enough money that their next project can be bigger. And if they somehow beat the odds, or manage to predict the markets and intentionally create The Next Big Thing, they'll have the money and the clout to make their dream project after 10 to 20 years of hard, often thankless work.

2) The entire point of Kickstarter is to give people a chance to break from the investor controlled world that makes the above true.

3) If people didn't want her to succeed she would not have been able to raise the funds. Vote with your wallet and leave others to vote with theirs.

1. I kind of support kickstarter projects that ACTUALLY require money to be started, like the Schaffer game. That being said, I'm not a fan of kickstarter in general, as people should have to produce quality content BEFORE people start throwing money at them. Proving your worth is something that should be done. This woman has not proved her worth, she just recycles tired arguments about dumb shit. Schaffer produced quality content in Day of the Tentacle and Psychonauts.
2. Pretty much answered with 1.
3. People want their views validated with other people who share their views. This is more why she's succeeding than anything she's produced. That and I'm convinced the last $20k she's raised is to spite the idiots on youtube and the like.

1) People make games on shoestring budgets as well, so I'm not sure what the difference is. Regardless, you have no say over what I do with my money(I didn't help fund this project, but that's irrelevant to my argument) or what anyone else does with theirs. My point is that the industry(any industry) is a terrible thankless environment for anyone with creative aspirations. Creative aspirations aren't often profitable, you see. And that's the only reason people have to prove themselves in the first place: to protect investments. And Kickstarter takes that need out of the equation, as there are no investors to pay back.

2) Ditto.

3) That's as valid a reason to throw money away as any other(since there is no promise of success, any money pledged to a Kickstarter project is more or less a gift). As for the second part, well then maybe those haters should have remembered the first rule of publicity: There is No Such Thing as Bad Publicity.

 

[Kahunaburger]

Yahtzee was offered money to do what he does after he created videos that were interesting and new-for free.

Which is exactly what happened with this kickstarter, as well. People wouldn't be throwing $70,000 dollars at this documentary if FF hadn't built up credibility.

Do you honestly believe that that many people have heard of this chick before this? No. I checked her series, she averaged around 60-70k hits as far as I could tell. Nowhere near enough exposure to draw this kind of backing.

She hit her kickstarter goal in 24 hours. So yeah, apparently pretty credible with people willing and able to make kickstarter donations. The difference between her 70K viewers and (say) xXx1337Noscopez420xXx's much larger "gameplay and commentary" viewer-base is that more of the FF viewer-base are employed, opinionated adults who have both money to pitch into a kickstarter fund and the desire to do so.

 

[Angryman101]

Side boob exposure? You made that blasphemous link, not me.

Look at women's issues of today. Look at yesteryear. Things are better. Look at civil rights issues for African-Americans of today and yesteryear. Better. But still broken when compared to the rights and privileges to men in America and Japan, the places where games are made. Sure, everyone has their kicks, but their kicks don't really limit them in such a drastic way.

Things are BETTER? Things are worse than fucking every. More women are unhappy, and more are on antidepressants than ever before. The only people things today are good for are attractive, intelligent men. Why is that? Because feminism. So, good job to feminists, I guess. lol.
'Rights and privileges to men in America/Japan'
Hahahaha. Right. Divorce rape, alimony, child support, false rape claims, and a biased judicial and media system. It must be hard being a woman, seeing how other, more attractive women seem to drive men insane while they barely give a plain jane the time of day.

 

[CosmicCommander]

Stupid responses to that video, without a shadow of a doubt. I think a good portion of them are just trolling, though.

The thing is, I dislike this project too. Maybe I'm sexist? I'd acknowledge it could be taken that way, but I'm just tired of egalitarianism, tolerance, and respect making their way into games. I can understand why women are frustrated, but I'm just feeling that the medium is being clinicalised and rationalised too much. All of society is clean and pleasant these days, there's nowhere for any sort of base passions or beliefs to be expressed and enjoyed.

In short, I'd say this tropes project is a noble goal that will inevitably aid gaming's slide into being really fucking boring, dull, and civilised.

 

[Dreiko_v1legacy]

AS much as this documentary is pointless, the story is about the abuse she is recieving. That isn't called for and it's disgusting, she obviously doesn't deserve that. She also doesn't really deserve her kickstarter funding either.

True, and I don't dispute that it isn't called for and it makes me embarassed to associate my gender with these people, but I mean, why make a news report for this? If there was a news report every time a bunch of misogynists were being scum, we'd never learn anything outside of youtube/xbox live. Sure it's unacceptable, but we aren't fixing anything, and we aren't learning anything - anyone who saw this project knew right away this was going to happen.

I for one am glad it's been featured.
I've had people tell me sexism is no longer a problem in our community, with a straight face. Which is just bizzarre to me. Obviously as a girl I've seen my fair share, and there are times where I begin to think there is no point trying to change anything.

But I don't think it should ever be something we should just accept. Gaming sites/gamers saying this is not acceptable is a positive thing, and I'm happy to see it. People who don't participate in it but sit quietly as it goes on don't help.

Exactly. The comments, for the most part, don't discuss whether or not her point of view is valid, or whether the documentary would be worthwhile, they just come out swinging about how she's a Jew that needs a good dicking...except she's a lesbian and the commenters wouldn't fuck her, anyway.

Disagreeing with her point of view is fine, as is thinking her Kickstarter is a lousy idea. This isn't about whether or not her point of view is correct, it's about the sheer level of vitriol being directed at her. People frequently claim there's no sexism in gaming communities...well, take a look, gang. It's out there and it's ugly. Just saying "we knew this would happen" and shrugging it off isn't enough. Maybe some readers aren't "learning anything" because they're aware this goes on, but perhaps we educate some who truly didn't know it got this bad.

I think the reaction is more akin to one about a car being stolen in a bad neighborhood when the keys are left in the ignition. We know how it is. It sucks but surprising or news-worthy it is not.


Bringing it up and letting people know something that they are already aware of is hardly productive and its only effect is to make the news-barer feel righteous and useful.

 

[Angryman101]

She hit her kickstarter goal in 24 hours. So yeah, apparently pretty credible with people willing and able to make kickstarter donations. The difference between her 70K viewers and (say) xXx1337Noscopez420xXx's much larger "gameplay and commentary" viewer-base is that more of the FF viewer-base are employed, opinionated adults who have both money to pitch into a kickstarter fund and the desire to do so.

Hello, baseless claim!
Also, if it were only $6k, I would be somewhat perturbed, but would give less of a shit than I do now. She has over $70k, though, because she's in the middle of a clash between a notoriously self-righteous, frivolous-spending ideology and the fucking monkeys on youtube. She is gaining money because of people's dumbfuckery and it steams my ass to the extent of qualifying my position and engaging in debate on an online gaming forum.

 

[Eamar]

Things are BETTER? Things are worse than fucking every. More women are unhappy, and more are on antidepressants than ever before. The only people things today are good for are attractive, intelligent men. Why is that? Because feminism. So, good job to feminists, I guess. lol.

Aaaaaand let's all stop feeding this guy. Any semblance of credibility has been lost. Good job.

 

[Di-Dorval]

Oh no people are being mean on the internet!.. Pretty pointless article imo.

Stupid responses to that video, without a shadow of a doubt. I think a good portion of them are just trolling, though.

The thing is, I dislike this project too. Maybe I'm sexist? I'd acknowledge it could be taken that way, but I'm just tired of egalitarianism, tolerance, and respect making their way into games. I can understand why women are frustrated, but I'm just feeling that the medium is being clinicalised and rationalised too much. All of society is clean and pleasant these days, there's nowhere for any sort of base passions or beliefs to be expressed and enjoyed.

In short, I'd say this tropes project is a noble goal that will inevitably aid gaming's slide into being really fucking boring, dull, and civilised.

Great response. Yea most seems to just be trolls for the fun of it I mean kitchen jokes.. how can you take theses seriously..

And female are stereotypes because of marketing reasons. Plus there isn't that much female main characters (because demographic) so most are side characters and thus can't reach has much depth.
It's already a debated to death and understood issue...

 

[Khazoth]

Oh no people are being mean on the internet!.. Pretty pointless article imo.

And female are stereotypes because of marketing reasons. Plus there isn't that much female main characters (because demographic) so most are side characters and thus can't reach has much depth.
It's already a debated to death and understood issue...

Pointless implies sexism doesn't get views and money.


I don't intend for the following to be mean, or hurtful, but honest criticism. But if not for the sexism this honestly boring body of work wouldn't have netted anyone giving her the money to make her series.

So pointless? Naaaaaah. Escapist is raking in the views today.

 

[disappointed]

I wonder how much shouting about this subject there has to be before mainstream game publishers start to think that maybe they should have a go at making games that reflect a broader emotional range than just horny teenage boy. I don't suppose this video will reach any of the right people but it's worth a try...