The Big Picture: Tropes vs. MovieBob

[ACman]

Oh, yeah, while we're at it, her standards for what counts as a "good portrayal of women in gaming" appears to be totally non-existent. If there's a good example of a female character, she picks some random trait like "is violent" and uses that to condemn the character as being not good enough, even though being violent in bloody True Grit is not exactly a drawback.

Oh no she doesn't like the portrayal of women in videogames!!!!

WAAAAAHHH!

Look I don't particularly agree with her either but she has a right to say these things, - a right to make videos about it, and a right to start a kickstarter to fund those videos.

And people have a right to give to that kick starter and did in large numbers even before the sexism shit-storm.

All I've seen from you guys is a bunch attempts to invalidate those rights purely because you disagree with her. Either ignore her or actually engage with her on a mature level. If you can't do either of those things then you validate her point of view and make us gamer guys look worse.

 

[Casey Goddard]

Meh...I just wish there were more women protagonists in video games:

http://caseygoddard.blogspot.jp/2011/01/where-have-all-gaming-girls-gone.html

 

[Voltano]

EVERY artistic medium in the last 200 years have gone to the Supreme Court to defend its art value - because of attempts to legislate against new art forms, up to and including comics and motion pictures. The results of this were not legal censorship, but generally the formation of groups and agreements like the MPAA and the Comics Code that exist to preserve the right to free speech through voluntary self-regulation.

Now here's the thing, you don't see film buffs reacting this way when their hobby is "under fire" for having problems with how women, men, etc. are portrayed. Or even if there's a reaction from PETA (hello Humane Society approved "No Animals Were Harmed").

True, however the film (and books--comic books possibly, but arguable) have a longer history and a larger library of products in their history than video games do. Films like Micheal Bay's "Transformers" are definitely offensive (not just to women), but there may be other films like "Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" that are not as offensive. Anita in her "Feminist Frequency" episodes tends to generalize everyone in Hollywood as writing tropes/stereotypes of women in her "Tropes vs. Women" series. To that I kind of agree with her that there are some tropes/stereotypes made in main stream films, but everyone? That seems hard to buy.

I'm not defending what gamers said to Anita here or what some of the more conservative, ignorant gamers think women should serve a roll as. I understand their thesis that there is a problem with one side not respecting the other. However, could this work in reverse? Moviebob shows it well here (and even states) that he has to be snobbish and scolding to us gamers in this video...so we could be not so snobbish and scolding of another group? Regardless if we're talking about Feminists or other minority groups, telling group A that you are alienating group B, yet giving no advice or examples or even suggestions on how the two groups could work together (excluding a big factor that you mentioned, money), then it would seem hard for group A to consider group B's complaint.

As for "money is a universal language:"

Do you know why there tends to be more diversity in films than video games (not saying there's a LOT more, but there IS more) - feminists, minorities, moral crusaders, lobby groups and art critics have and STILL ARE fought for representation through lawsuits, awareness campaigns, criticism, and money. Money has historically been the most persuasive method, as they're shouting "we are a demographic that should be marketed to" has been great business. This is why the extreme right have an entire market for Christian films, why Tyler Perry has a repeatable audience, and why Quentin Tarantino can make Kill Bill - because groups went out of their way to be heard and say that they have a right to watch art that appeals to them. How does Hollywood handle it? Through experimenting with the demo. They hear demand for a certain kind of film, with specific actors, and they work hard on attracting an untapped market. How do film fans handle it? They watch the films they want to watch, praise them or critique them depending on their reaction.

Why are we not seeing games made from Feminists? I'm not talking about a triple-A, "Goddess of War" kind of game to rival Kratos (Kratala?), but something made in their image that they can distribute. Release it as a Flash game on Newgrounds or as an Indie game on Xbox Live Arcade. SUPPORT game designers fresh out of College or laid off by hiring them to help you make the game YOU want!

Money. Feminist games have not been proving as anything but a niche market because, well, part of the problem is that male gamers don't make it a welcoming environment. Not to say there haven't been games that made the attempt. Hey Baby (http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/sexist/2010/06/02/hey-baby-the-first-person-shooter/) is one extreme example of a feminist game.

I know making a game is hard work--and VERY expensive, but I don't think it has to be this expensive. I'm not talking astronomical numbers like what comes out of the daily droppings of an EA CEO's daily thought process, but something like $5000, average, could potentially introduce some more games in our community to get the message across without being as snobbish or scolding like Moviebob is here. PETA made a game shortly after the release of "Super Meat Boy" using Tofu Man (boy?) to express how horrible Meat boy is--whether it was good or not is debatable. And I did mention that they could hire a fresh game designer right out of college (like me) to work with them. Doing something like this would increase more job opportunities and potential market for games targeted toward women--something Feminists want, and if the game is enticing to several players, it could recieve bigger funding in the future. "Call of Duty" series didn't become a game-leading franchise overnight, but started in familiar territory of WWII shooters and moved to science-fiction settings.

Unfortunately, you do bring up a point that discrimination will hinder games like this happening. Capcom might have encountered this in the development of "Dragon's Dogma" [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/117324-Capcom-Faces-Bullying-Accusation], and we'll always encounter other people that would disagree or stick to conservative views of another group to their grave. Maybe that idea of young game designers I mentioned will be the sexist conservatives you brought up--and to that, I'd say it would suck to be them. They are willing to pass up a chance for a job to work on a game that might turn out to be fun and good practice for their skills--just because they don't like their boss due to stereotype views? That's stupid, and honestly not worth working with them if they want to be ignorant like that.

I'm a white, heterosexual young game designer that is trying to get into this field, yet I will admit that I am dumb, ignorant, and directionless on how to build a game that would be appealing towards women. I do believe there is an untapped market that would provide more diversity in the gaming industry, but only if we'll work together. Listening to Anita and other Feminists gives me the impression that they know how to tell a story where women are respected or have good role models. Great! I want to hear that stuff! But I'd also like to see this being done instead of just being told how to do such a thing. Not all of us gamers are sexists as Moviebob generalizes us to be, and the only way to show this is to make a game that shows this, in my view.

 

[ACman]

I love it when people complain about straw men.

You claimed I held a position I do not actually hold. That is the definition of a strawman. The rest of your post is just claiming that a scam does not count as a scam because it worked. Leveraging her faux-victim status IS A SCAM because she's selling the line that she's bravely prevailing against trolls or whatever, when all she's doing is refusing to clean up her own comments sections and forcing her viewers to deal with all the trash so that they'll donate to her out of pity.

It may no be an opinion that you hold but it is clearly an opinion that several guys on this page hold.

And you might complain that kickstarter doesn't set high enough standards for their projects but that doesn't make any of those projects scams. She's doing work, doing that work may cost money to do, her time also costs money.

She's also not likely to be able to sell the product she creates. She asked for $6000 dollars which is not unreasonable for improved editing suites, cameras, computers etc.

She got $24,000 before the sexist outcry, and being a feminist blogger it's not unreasonable that she make something of the sexist outcry. The fact that what she made is another $125,000 is irrelevant (And rather amusing).

 

[Durgiun]

"Society judges women based on their appearence rather than their ability"
A valid argument yes and realistic enough to be taken seriously, but there's always two sides to a coin.

If you really want to get to the root of the problem, ie, why women have their general value based on the exterior, is to ask the right question.

Is it ONLY because society and heterosexual white males judge them by their appearence
OR
could it be the fact that some women really don't help that problem at all by simply, oh i dunno
PRESENTING THEMSELVES AS IF THAT IS ALL THEY HAVE TO OFFER

seriously, i don't see this argument as valid if it comes from someone who only posts cleavage pictures of themselves on facebook and tweets about all the money they spend on cosmetic bullshit, then you are not entitled to have this argument with me.
If women would like to be judged by their abilities, then show it, make me believe you would actually want that rather than spending countless hours and resources on perfecting your appearence, thats not going to help at all, thats just making it worse for the kind of women who already have it bad and are actually suffering from this problem.

Too often do women expect to get handed everything and not be judged by their ability, because they think their appearence is enough.
So both parts imo have to do their parts in the sense that

Some women need to stop focusing on their appearence and using that as an excuse to
get what they want, and also stop presenting themselves as if the appearence was the most important thing to them.

While some men and society and general needs to stop making these retarded demands from women and portray them in one specific way in media and so on.

This is not a problem to solely blame on society and the heterosexual male

One internet for you! And if I was anywhere near you, I'd give you a brofist.

 

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

I do agree with Bob here and there some stupid arguments but I have to say there is not a massive gaping hole with a lack of good female character that aren't the blank slates. People don't tend to remember the good ones unless they are really famous.

 

[jmarquiso]

I didn't have the time to get to your post, but I really wanted to respond to this.

I'm a white, heterosexual young game designer that is trying to get into this field, yet I will admit that I am dumb, ignorant, and directionless on how to build a game that would be appealing towards women. I do believe there is an untapped market that would provide more diversity in the gaming industry, but only if we'll work together. Listening to Anita and other Feminists gives me the impression that they know how to tell a story where women are respected or have good role models. Great! I want to hear that stuff! But I'd also like to see this being done instead of just being told how to do such a thing. Not all of us gamers are sexists as Moviebob generalizes us to be, and the only way to show this is to make a game that shows this, in my view.

There IS a market! Seriously. The funding for this video proves it. You know, she's still trying to figure out what to do with the rest of the kickstarter money, why don't you contact her and offer your services, asking her what she wants. Get some cash out of it as she has some now (she's already using a lot of it for things like school curriculum design, amongst others), but if you offer your services as a recent game designer, I'd say try.

I mentioned organizations out there for women working in the game industry, find a way to contact them. Get something on your portfolio and POWER TO YOU.

That is awesome.

Edit: and I would say that the "you" MovieBob is referring to are the people making the argument he's refuting.

 

[Marudas]

When I heard about this freakout I noted a couple things. The first and unrelated to the actual discussion is, why do you need a Kickstarter to make a Youtube series? They aren't exactly expensive to make most of the time. Not that important though.

Now, I do have to address one part of this. I agree with pretty much everything Bob laid down here, but I wanted to mention one thing about the "surrounding circumstances". Yes, male characters and female characters are made to appeal to young heterosexual boys, and yes, this means you get shallow lampposts with watermelons stapled to them. But that's because, especially until just a few years ago, videogaming as a whole was almost universally targeted towards boys. What I'm trying to poke at with this is, while I'm all for more depth in female characters beyond what we have, I don't think that video games with obvious sex appeal characters needs to be investigated for sexism any more than Twilight like female romance smut novels that are specifically made to appeal to women do.

Now, that said, I would still like to see women with personality in a game. Female characters with more depth and complexity beyond their usual treatment would be a great thing to have in gaming, and it doesn't have to auto-assassinate the sex appeal in the process.

Also, while writing this, I wanted to mention one more thing: Being a male gamer who is actively friends with several female gamers, I can safely say that one thing applies equally to both genders. When Bob says that Marcus Fenix and like male characters are made that way to appeal to the male heterosexual gamer, its true. However, it seems my female gaming counterparts also like playing female characters who are embellished in design. I know that most (almost all) current modern video games aren't making the female characters look that way for them, but its something to think about, i thought. Anecdotal evidence, i know, but I can surmise that there might be more female gamers out there who want their characters to have both the depth and the looks.

 

[Sexual Harassment Panda]

Darn, Moviebob, here I was thinking my opinion of you couldn't drop any lower.
Probably the most painful part of the clip was "women won't get a job because they look mediocre but men will because who cares about what men look like". Idk how it's like in the good ol us of a, but here in the EU, it's pretty much identical.
You don't look as fit as an underwear model(either male or female)? Gratz, you just lost out on a TON of job opportunities.

The entire thing just stank of double standards and white knight nonsense to me and I'm not even anti-feminist

Don't know about the example, but I agree with the sentiment.

Male distaste for feminists isn't a videogame based phenomenon, men aren't annoyed because women are lobbying for Lara to have smaller breasts. Believe it or not...it goes deeper.

I haven't watched much Feminist frequency, because...she seems like a bit of a prat, by my reckoning. I will plug girlwriteswhat as someone who speaks about gender issues that is worth listening to.

http://www.youtube.com/user/girlwriteswhat

She is awesome.

Indeed.

I don't have a problem with adressing Woman issues, what I have a problem with is that anything regarding Men is consistently ignored to promote female issues of far less importance.

Don't be silly, men don't have issues, it's not like they're killing themselves at a completely disproportionate and alarming rate...oh, wait.

Oh, yeah, while we're at it, her standards for what counts as a "good portrayal of women in gaming" appears to be totally non-existent. If there's a good example of a female character, she picks some random trait like "is violent" and uses that to condemn the character as being not good enough, even though being violent in bloody True Grit is not exactly a drawback.

This thread caused me to look up more of her videos.

You see, Mattie Ross is strong, but she's a male version of strong... I suppose that instead of killing Tom Chaney, she should have spared him and given him a speech about how it was because she's a woman and above violence. Mattie Ross is an emotionally closed off character, and that's not a male exclusive attribute.

At any rate, it's better than her thoughts on Sucker Punch. If you ask me, Sucker Punch is a lousey film. I do find it funny that she completely missed the satire in it though. The way she called Snyder a "parasite" and accused him of living in a perpetual state of adolescence was great too, classy stuff.

The correct way to analyse things is to get the raw data(actually evaluate it) and then build a theory around it. Starting with a theory in place, and then looking for evidence to support it is ass backwards, and I reckon that's what she did...it might explain why she missed certain things.

I think it's probably pretty hard to be objective when feminism is your entire schtick, savvy?

 

[Finalplayerryu]

I really hate when people come with arguments that say

"Well, 10 years ago this and that was created for that kinda people or for that kinda purpose"

Dont get me wrong, if you use that to look how things were, thats ok, but dont put purposes of the past in the present. You have to look at things from todays point of view. Sure muscular men were created as heroes for children and men alike, but nowadays this purpose has gained more perspective as they also target women.

Also i get the feeling that people these days really make trolls and haters alike the happiest persons in the world, because you give them so much attention. Seriously... if i had a controversial idea, project, etc etc, i would straight out delete every frigging comment that shows no maturity and cant argue without WAHWAHWAH!

 

[The Cheshire]

"Sexual self-image fantasies FOR YOU"

Hahahaha, loved that. You're on fire this week, congratulations.

 

[Machine Man 1992]

Complaining that videogames cater to men is like complaining that the Oxygen channel caters to women; there's going to be pandering and NO ONE SHOULD CARE

Except there are other channels to turn to. Games have less options.

Oxygen came from women demanding it, and viacom realizing it had an untapped audience to sell advertising to. Games could have the larger market, too, if they just listen.

Then make them listen! Tell developers you want more games with strong female protagonists! Tell them you want shirtless hunks to oogle! You have more power than you realize; if publishers realize they have an untapped market, they'll clamber over each other to tap that (see what I did there?).

 

[itsthesheppy]

Regarding Bob's claim that women are more discriminated against than men when applying for a job I decided to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics to see if it was true. If the level of female unemployment was much higher then male unemployment then this would support Bob's claim.

On this website I found a report on the current economic situation in the USA:
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.toc.htm

Table A-6 lists the employment status of the civilian population by sex, age, and disability status. This table clearly shows that women have the same or lower unemployment levels than men.
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t06.htm

So Bob's claim that discrimination against men applying for a job is as rare as an albino buffalo is clearly wrong because the unemployment levels show men do not have higher levels of employment and are even at a disadvantage when compared to women.

Hopefully in the future Bob will do basic research before making such claiming that women are suffering from some sort of disadvantage.

That the unemployment levels of women and men are similar doesn't mean anything when it comes to job discrimination. The 'basic research' you're referring to is so basic, it has caused you to make incorrect assumptions. Is it possible, perhaps, the male unemployment might go up not because they are being discriminated against for jobs, but because there aren't as many opportunities for blue-collar work like factory labor, construction and so forth? The recession hit those industries hard, and those are usually male-oriented jobs. That doesn't have anything to do with sex discrimination, and everything to do with a weak economy.

 

[itsthesheppy]

Complaining that videogames cater to men is like complaining that the Oxygen channel caters to women; there's going to be pandering and NO ONE SHOULD CARE

Except there are other channels to turn to. Games have less options.

Oxygen came from women demanding it, and viacom realizing it had an untapped audience to sell advertising to. Games could have the larger market, too, if they just listen.

Then make them listen! Tell developers you want more games with strong female protagonists! Tell them you want shirtless hunks to oogle! You have more power than you realize; if publishers realize they have an untapped market, they'll clamber over each other to tap that (see what I did there?).

Video series like the one there is so much resistance to are very much in line with what you are suggesting 'they' do. Raise their voices about the inequality.

 

[Machine Man 1992]

Complaining that videogames cater to men is like complaining that the Oxygen channel caters to women; there's going to be pandering and NO ONE SHOULD CARE

Except there are other channels to turn to. Games have less options.

Oxygen came from women demanding it, and viacom realizing it had an untapped audience to sell advertising to. Games could have the larger market, too, if they just listen.

Then make them listen! Tell developers you want more games with strong female protagonists! Tell them you want shirtless hunks to oogle! You have more power than you realize; if publishers realize they have an untapped market, they'll clamber over each other to tap that (see what I did there?).

Video series like the one there is so much resistance to are very much in line with what you are suggesting 'they' do. Raise their voices about the inequality.

Well, if negative reinforcement doesn't work, how about positive reinforcement? Surely there are plenty of female game designers and producers out there, maybe instead of complaining, Anita could say, use the loads of money she has to finance a game? Just a thought.

 

[Maldeus]

All I've seen from you guys is a bunch attempts to invalidate those rights

Not a single damn one of us ever said they don't have the right to do these things. Just because we consider them amoral and/or stupid doesn't mean we think they should be illegal. I'm done dealing with your idiotic strawmen.

 

[itsthesheppy]

Complaining that videogames cater to men is like complaining that the Oxygen channel caters to women; there's going to be pandering and NO ONE SHOULD CARE

Except there are other channels to turn to. Games have less options.

Oxygen came from women demanding it, and viacom realizing it had an untapped audience to sell advertising to. Games could have the larger market, too, if they just listen.

Then make them listen! Tell developers you want more games with strong female protagonists! Tell them you want shirtless hunks to oogle! You have more power than you realize; if publishers realize they have an untapped market, they'll clamber over each other to tap that (see what I did there?).

Video series like the one there is so much resistance to are very much in line with what you are suggesting 'they' do. Raise their voices about the inequality.

Well, if negative reinforcement doesn't work, how about positive reinforcement? Surely there are plenty of female game designers and producers out there, maybe instead of complaining, Anita could say, use the loads of money she has to finance a game? Just a thought.

You, like many others, are falling into the trap of suggesting that you have better ideas for this woman about how she could be spending her time. That perhaps she should be working directly with game developers rather than being all uppity and making noise you would rather not have to hear. You may or may not be aware that you're doing it, but it's known in the feminist parlance as 'mansplaining'.

Mansplaining is when a guy tells a woman (or anyone else, I suppose) that he has a better idea about what she is trying to do, or say. Putting himself in the automatic position of authority and talking down to that individual, educating them about the err of their ways or the superior way of going about something. Even if the intent is altruistic (I have no reason to believe you have anything but the best intentions in mind), it is condescending.

There is a place in the world for commentary, negative and positive. Pointing out the negative aspects of a thing promotes a cultural conversation about it, and this is a conversation that we all should be having. It's a conversation people want to hear. She only asked for $6k to produce the series, and given what little I know about the costs involved in producing videos, it didn't seem entirely unreasonable. That she's had more than $150k donated is indicative of the fact that people want to hear what she has to say and it is not my place, or yours, to tell her what she should and should not do. That's up to her.

If you feel your idea is vastly superior to hers, and if you care enough about it, back up your own rhetoric and start a fund of your own, and then you can do whatever you like with it.

 

[ObsidianJones_v1legacy]

Hey, quick question that I just don't have the time to go through seventeen pages to look through.

Since all the examples were white, and those power fantasies weren't made for me as a black dude (given I can never look like that)... can I still complain? Or is it since they are still male, it matters more than not being my race? and if that's the case, doesn't the fact that they are female matter more than the body type?

I'm not trying to troll, but this is the flip side of the argument that I also deal with on a daily basis. I figure if we can knock them both out at once, we can stop dealing with this on all sides.

 

[Purplecoyote]

The thing that bugs me the most is not that female characters are so often put in these sexy outfits but that it's all there is to them. They are not created with a real personality in mind but more like "let's make a sexy female character and we'll write a personality to go with it."

And of course that females are often put in sexy outfits for the viewer and not for the sake of the character itself. That's why I love Bayonetta so much, as was said on the PAX pannel that the Escapist did a few years ago, "Bayonetta is hot, but she's not hot for you."

But so far I'm still waiting for gaming's Ellen Ripley. Femshep comes close but we're not quite there yet.

 

[ACman]

All I've seen from you guys is a bunch attempts to invalidate those rights

Not a single damn one of us ever said they don't have the right to do these things. Just because we consider them amoral and/or stupid doesn't mean we think they should be illegal. I'm done dealing with your idiotic strawmen.

Did I say that you said that you were saying that they should be illegal? Seems like you're building your own straw-man buddy.

What I said was that you disregard the rights of and opinions of everybody who decided to donate to the kick-starter merely because you disagree with the opinions of it's creator.

There's absolutly no evidence that you give a damn about and other kickstarter that fulfils the yours and other's definition of being a "scam". (A word generally reserved for things like pyramid and ponzi schemes - which ARE illegal.)