Sexy "Power Armor", am I 'juvenile' for liking it? (a response to recent Kill La Kill concepts)

[MrMan999]

A few months ago I tried some Japanese MMOG where all the men looked... Well how to put it, gay? (No offence to anyone.) Weird and even more skimpy than the female usually are. Even more than in FF games.

As I wrote above: Japanese videogames are a lot more progressive in appealing to both genders.

On the down side, when Japanese DO want to appeal only to males, they go full-out. See: Dead Or Alive, Bayonetta, etc. etc.
But you just don't care because they explicitly say "look, this game's for dudes, see. But worry not, all these other games we made have skimpy girls AND skimpy men".

Moral of the story - those skimpy outfits look good only on females.

I say it's because you're a heterosexual male that you think this....

Honestly I would argue that Bayonetta is a parody of Oversexualization.

 

[Tiamattt]

I would never judge you on it, I have no reason to and well whoever does needs to find something better to do. Sure it's not practical, at all but it's not like you can't find a ton of other superheroines in skimpy outfits that doesn't offer them 1 bit of protection. Although personally if I was going fot "power armor" I would want, well you know armor.

Spoiler

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Not saying that fan service is bad, but it is possible to have something that looks sexy yet look like it would actually do it's job.

 

[Yuuki]

I get why the OP edited his post to clarify what he meant, and I read it before posting here (unlike a shitload of people in the last few pages who are hung-up on the "proper definition" of fictional power armor).

I'm fine with sexy armor/clothing in fantasy/fiction. People who call it "juvenile" only end up coming across as immature, because they feel the need to categorize/label things even though there's nothing to be gained from doing that.
There is an audience for everything, that audience can vary, and attempting to JUDGE/DISMISS that entire audience as "juvenile" or "immature kids lulz" is in itself immature.

Respect the fact that there is a market/audience for everything and don't generalize about entire groups. If some people desperately feel the need to label/judge, simply keep it to yourself.

 

[Voulan]

Mate, you can like whatever you want.

...

However. Don't you dare refer to that... that as "armor". Just don't.

It's a sex doll outfit. Acknowledge it for what it is.

If I were to strip buck naked and put on a traditional plate helmet, I would still be wearing armor, just not very much of it. Armor does not automatically mean "suit of armor."
For example, the traditional armor of the average roman soldier left both the arms and legs mostly uncovered, providing almost all of it's protection exclusively to the chest an abdomen. While we could not call this a full suit of armor it was certainly armor. And while we could not call the armor we're discussing a realistic suit of armor, we can call it highly sexualised fantasy armor.
Whether it is armor or not depends not upon our perception of what armor should be, but on the context provided by the source material.

I'll second this. It's clearly meant to be pandering and invites us to look at her sexually, which is the exact opposite of what armour is supposed to do.

I dislike usage of the word "pandering" outside of a political context, seen as it basically means "catering to a particular audience" in a general sense.
Now there's no doubt that this particular set of armor is highly sexualised, but that is in no way "the opposite of what armor is supposed to do."
The primary purpose of armor is certainly to protect, but historically it was commonly used to promote a certain image of one's self. Now admittedly this image is usually one of a strong leader or royalty. But I don't think it's too much of leap for a creator of a fictional work to use armor for image promotion of a non-traditional image.

Rarely do male armour sets give us the same impression. And since almost all female characters are dressed like this, it presents an ideological perspective of women being sex objects. Ideologies are invisible, hence many people responding "so what?" because it being harmful is not immediately apparent.

You're being overly general here.
Almost all female characters dress like this? really? Because I rarely see stuff like that in films, television or video games. Admittedly I don't know enough about anime to make a judgement for that particular medium, but the anime I have watched hasn't dabbled in anything so explicitly sexual without worthy justification.

So, you're not bad in finding it attractive, but it might be beneficial to consider why women are almost exclusively dressed this way, while men aren't.

I don't know what you mean by "attractive" but the OP did explicitly state "I really liked it and not in the 'in my pants' kind of way."
And like I say above, I don't think women are (almost) exclusively dressed this way in any medium besides porn.

I wouldn't use the Romans as an example, though. The reason why the majority were mostly uncovered was because it was a policy that you had to purchase your own armour, and unless you were from an Elite family that had money at their disposal (which was a massive minority), your armour was going to be on the lighter side. Those that could afford good armour did so because the Romans prided prestige and presentation. If everyone could, they would be covered up more. You also have to bear in mind that they usually fought in hot climates, and had to travel by foot to their battles carrying all their weapons (again, only the Elite were able to afford horses). And I highly doubt when an artist draws a female in armour he is considering that she is doing so to present an image of herself - notably, he is dressing her in the image he wants to convey.

But anyway, as you say, the main purpose of armour is to protect, and that outfit fails completely in all those regards. As Ellie says in Borderlands, "It's not as though the bad guys will only aim for my saucy bits." Deliberately revealing the parts of the female body considered sexual is pretty much pandering, however you slice it. And I am using pandering to your definition there, as I believe it is only keeping a certain audience in mind here and appealing to them almost insultingly.

I'm over generalising for the sake of the point here, in that a vast majority of female characters in most media (and extremely in anime) are deliberately dressed in this way. And in doing so, we are being invited to use the male gaze on her - a term coined by scholar Judith Butler - which allows us to objectify her as an Other. She simply becomes a collection of body parts for us to oogle and desire. There is no other point to the outfit. And this kind of degradation is everywhere - if you're not seeing it as the majority, then perhaps you're not really looking for it. If its sexiness is in a completely unnecessary context - like killing people, of all things - then it is just stupid. Especially if the men are dressed completely sensibly. And as you even say at the end there, women are dressed like this in porn; so what does this outfit say?

 

[FoolKiller]

I always love how people say that the armour isn't realistic when very little of the fantasy world is realistic. It's designed to be eye candy. Is it sexist? Perhaps. Does that make it bad? Not necessarily.

 

[Voulan]

I always love how people say that the armour isn't realistic when very little of the fantasy world is realistic. It's designed to be eye candy. Is it sexist? Perhaps. Does that make it bad? Not necessarily.

All sexism is bad. It invites us to see negative and belittling things about a certain type of person, and to view them as inferior. Would you not agree that racism is harmful? If you don't see it that way then I'm... pretty concerned for humanity.

 

[Olas]

I always love how people say that the armour isn't realistic when very little of the fantasy world is realistic. It's designed to be eye candy. Is it sexist? Perhaps. Does that make it bad? Not necessarily.

I think there's a difference between something being "unrealistic" and something being blatantly absurd. You could argue that most dragons depicted in fiction could never fly because their wings are too small, but that's not obvious to most people who aren't experts on the aerodynamics of lift.

However, if I was charging into battle and I saw an enemy wearing that "armor" my immediate reaction would be something along the lines of

'Oh no! It's too intimidating! I guess I should just surrender right now!

Maybe that's the brilliance of it, the enemy is too busy laughing to actually attack.

 

[Ryotknife]

BTW I'm trying to imagine a fantasy RPG with a half-naked guy running around killing monsters... Gosh that would look stupid.

Also now I have to go watch DB again.

Doesn't dark souls have the deprived class who wear nothing but a loincloth?

 

[Specter Von Baren]

It's not true we women don't like some nice, ahem, visuals.

Heh, I'm aware that women can appreciate the 'visuals' as well and I think it's rather sweet when you can speak out about such matters. It's just in my experience it's not all that important in videogames.

But I'm fine with being proved wrong so if you don't mind, I'd like to pick your brain about whether including the skimpy males alternative would actually make a game more attractive for women? I'm genuinely curious, because I would guess it won't. (BTW: I'm gonna be helping with development of a game so I may even use some of this knowledge.)

Exhibit A) games like Dead or Alive, X-Blades, Heavenly Sword - you know, the sort of games which are generally rather crappy but have bikini female main characters so they get the attention of guys.

Let's say these games would have a selection between skimpy females and skimpy males... Would you be more inclined to play them? If not, but you'd happen to be in a room with this game and time to kill, which character would you pick to play?

Exhibit B) games usually of the fantasy RPG sort typically with females with bikini armor and male barbarians with massive 800-pound armor. I think including a female barbarian is only fair, let's assume for a moment this option is present.

Would you also like an option to play as a skimpy male? Or would you like to see any of them around? Would it make a game more appealing?

BTW I'm trying to imagine a fantasy RPG with a half-naked guy running around killing monsters... Gosh that would look stupid.

Also now I have to go watch DB again.

I know I'm not a woman, and I know I'm not the one you were speaking to, but I want to give my opinion on this which is that, no, it wouldn't appeal to them.

My reasoning, and this is purely just me basing things on what I've seen and is in no way supported by any kind of study or anything, is this.

The kinds of men that women would be more likely to see as "eye-candy" are suave "gentleman" types. Men that are very handsome, wear nice clothes, speak eloquently and are charming.

I mean, just look at some art of Otome games.

Spoiler

Very fine features, pleasant smiles, suave, wearing suits in many cases.

The opposite of the "demeaning stereotype" of the skimpily clothed sexy woman that's meant to just be something to look at isn't a skimpily clothed manly man, it's a well dressed and well spoken "effeminate" man that does stuff for a girl.

 

[FoolKiller]

I always love how people say that the armour isn't realistic when very little of the fantasy world is realistic. It's designed to be eye candy. Is it sexist? Perhaps. Does that make it bad? Not necessarily.

All sexism is bad. It invites us to see negative and belittling things about a certain type of person, and to view them as inferior. Would you not agree that racism is harmful? If you don't see it that way then I'm... pretty concerned for humanity.

Except you misread what I wrote. The "it" doesn't refer to sexism. The "it" refers to the it in the previous question as well, which in this case is slutty armour.

I stand by what I wrote. The armour may be sexist but the armour isn't necessarily bad.

 

[FoolKiller]

I always love how people say that the armour isn't realistic when very little of the fantasy world is realistic. It's designed to be eye candy. Is it sexist? Perhaps. Does that make it bad? Not necessarily.

I think there's a difference between something being "unrealistic" and something being blatantly absurd. You could argue that most dragons depicted in fiction could never fly because their wings are too small, but that's not obvious to most people who aren't experts on the aerodynamics of lift.

However, if I was charging into battle and I saw an enemy wearing that "armor" my immediate reaction would be something along the lines of

'Oh no! It's too intimidating! I guess I should just surrender right now!

Maybe that's the brilliance of it, the enemy is too busy laughing to actually attack.

And in this case you're drawing an arbitrary line between what you think is unrealistic and what is absurd. Either its realistic or its not. Suspension of disbelief is a binary choice. The only problem is whether or not it breaks the rules of its own universe.

 

[Voulan]

I always love how people say that the armour isn't realistic when very little of the fantasy world is realistic. It's designed to be eye candy. Is it sexist? Perhaps. Does that make it bad? Not necessarily.

All sexism is bad. It invites us to see negative and belittling things about a certain type of person, and to view them as inferior. Would you not agree that racism is harmful? If you don't see it that way then I'm... pretty concerned for humanity.

Except you misread what I wrote. The "it" doesn't refer to sexism. The "it" refers to the it in the previous question as well, which in this case is slutty armour.

I stand by what I wrote. The armour may be sexist but the armour isn't necessarily bad.

I'm relieved then, but you might need to rewrite that post because it doesn't read that way at all. By the way you'd phrased it, it read like you came to the conclusion that its sexism wasn't bad, not that you thought the design was nice.

Still, if you admit that it has the potential to be sexist, then the design probably isn't a good thing. But anyway, I'll leave you alone now.

 

[Ed130 The Vanguard]

I always love how people say that the armour isn't realistic when very little of the fantasy world is realistic. It's designed to be eye candy. Is it sexist? Perhaps. Does that make it bad? Not necessarily.

I think there's a difference between something being "unrealistic" and something being blatantly absurd. You could argue that most dragons depicted in fiction could never fly because their wings are too small, but that's not obvious to most people who aren't experts on the aerodynamics of lift.

However, if I was charging into battle and I saw an enemy wearing that "armor" my immediate reaction would be something along the lines of

'Oh no! It's too intimidating! I guess I should just surrender right now!

Maybe that's the brilliance of it, the enemy is too busy laughing to actually attack.

And in this case you're drawing an arbitrary line between what you think is unrealistic and what is absurd. Either its realistic or its not. Suspension of disbelief is a binary choice. The only problem is whether or not it breaks the rules of its own universe.

Considering the males in the Kill La Kill universe apparently wear these:

Spoiler

And the character in question appears normally looking like this:

Spoiler

With other females appearing as:

Spoiler

I would consider it breaking SOD with information I gathered so far.