Kickstarter "Tropes vs Women in Videogames"

[dsheinem]

Art is art even if you find it distasteful. So let's ban this game because some can't pick up on satire. And the problem with their petition is the whole 'I dont like it, or am offended, so others shouldnt have access to it'. Instead of the 'I find it distasteful so I will choose not to buy it.'

I agree with all of this (including the sarcastic bits), and I am surprised the petition gained the traction that it did. I think they have every right to ask Kmart not to carry something through a formal process like the one they used...and Kmart has every right to do what it did in the name of sales or refuse them on the grounds of protecting free speech. They chose not to do the latter, so fuck Kmart. If I lived in Australia and cared enough to buy games there in the first place, I'd be raising a lot of hell in response...but I wouldn't be attacking the group for making false claims or for exercising their right to petition...

[BoneSnapDeez]

In the eyes of some, you're either part of the solution (Brainwashed Sarkeesianites) or a mysognyst cis gendered rapist.

Who has said this? Certainly not Anita Sarkeesian. Strawman statements like that help no one.

On the topic of GTA: I have never completed a single installment because, perceived sexism and violence aside, I find them insufferably dull and bordering on unplayable.

I have played through significant portions of the games as I have many friends and relatives who own them. I have a tough time swallowing that this type of thing is "satire." The writing is terrible and lazy. It isn't intelligent and lacks any real social criticism. I see the satire label thrown around haphazardly (and sometimes retroactively) to explain away anything potentially offensive. "Oh you mean you weren't smart enough to realize you were ironically killing a hooker?"

Any fans care to shed some light on the "purpose" and general appeal of this series?

I find it interesting that this discussion ended up in the "Tropes vs Women in Videogames" thread in the first place, as Sarkeesian's series is dedicated to critiquing games. She has had nothing at all to do with the banning or censorship of games, despite what many of her vocal detractors may say.

I like how video games flip flop between being art or just a game to fit the arguement.

I really like this post on the first page.

That Escapist article is hilarious. "BREAKING NEWS: Youtube commenters the scum of the earth!" Tomorrow's headline: "Video games largely targeted at adolescent boys!"

Anti-violence crusaders: Video games are aimed at children and filled with gratuitous and graphic violence.

The Video Game Community: The average age of gamers is 27 (or whatever) because games are aimed at adults.

Roger Ebert: Games are a brainless toy for children.

The Video Game Community: Games are art; they're interactivity allows them to affect the emotion of the player in a stronger way than other media.

Feminist Critics: Since video games are art, we should examine their depictions of women.

The Video Game Community: Games are toys for children, you're over-thinking them!

For the record, something can be both a game / "toy" and art.

[Key-Glyph]

Once again, nobody forced Wesfarmers to ban this game. The company chose to stop selling it because the decision makes them look like moral crusaders, it doesn't affect their current revenue intake in the slightest, it can't diminish the massive profit they already made on the game at launch, and it will probably motivate more shoppers to use their store in the future by engendering feelings of good-will ("Let's go to Australian Target -- remember that Very Big Stance they made on that One Game seven months after its release? So brave! So admirable!"). I find it very hard to believe that they felt the least bit intimidated by this campaign and saw it as anything but the massive public relations opportunity it was.

Had they chosen not to sell GTA V before its release date, or stopped selling all Rockstar or M-rated games, that would have been something. But again, that would be the company's decision as a private entity, and as dsh said, they're the ones to have beef with, not the campaigners. Unless the campaigners resort to threats of retaliatory violence, of course.

I like how video games flip flop between being art or just a game to fit the arguement.

This confuses me, too. What I gather from the general internet (not here) is that game developers' and publishers' rights are defended on the basis of free market capitalism ("They're just catering to their audience! You can't blame them for wanting to get paid!") until a large faction of that audience gives feedback on what they'd like to see changed, after which point the games are suddenly defended by many as primarily art ("How dare you suggest the creators' pure vision be beholden to your fancies?")

I mean, I've seen comments elsewhere on the internet where people snap between these two arguments so fast I get whiplash.

[Jmustang1968]

I do not know why it is in this thread and I am also not a big fan of GTA games. However, just because I dont like them doesnt mean they should be banned to others who do.

I also dont shy away from distasteful. Playing a video game that can show these sides of things or playing from a particular point of view, can offer up new or unique experiences that can make you uncomfortable. This may allow you to explore feelings and virtual actions of things that may actually help one self reflect from such activities.

Now I am not saying GTA particularly offers up these things in a great way, but it could.

[Erik_Twice]

Fair enough, but the term has its roots in psychology (wish-fulfillment) and isn't strictly about games. As I understand it, the "male" qualifier indicates simply that these are fantasies where men have power BECAUSE they are men and that part of the power represented in the fantasy is thus a power over women. I think it is an apt term, but I understand your reservations. What would you call it?

The problem is that one must first determine what those fantasies in which men have power because they are men are and that inevitably degrades into spurious claims about the behaviour of men and what they supposedly fantasize over.

I don't think I have a better term for it but something like"Chauvinist fantasy" would be a more precise term at least in this area. Of course, Grand Theft Auto V is not a chauvinist fantasy but a satire of the chauvinism of American culture through the lenses of crime. Or at least it's supposed to, I don't think the game manages to at all but it tries.

It's why people go ape shit over the content in games and not as much in movies. It might not be "fair" but you also can't hold games up as being a meaningful medium that provides unique ways of seeing the world and then dismiss that power and equate them with film when the game does something that might be offensive.

Eh, I'm not doing that. I just think a movie and a game may communicate something similar, even if they are different mediums. I mean, Social satire isn't limited to one kind of art.

I also think people are more concerned about games because, well, it's kind of a new thing, it's not seen as art but as that thing we don't understand that young people do and so on. Don't think it has really much to do with games themselves.


I also feel people don't actually flip flop a lot on the art/just a game debate, most of the time it's different people who say that. And, at least, I don't think anyone has gone both ways here

[dsheinem]

The problem is that one must first determine what those fantasies in which men have power because they are men are and that inevitably degrades into spurious claims about the behaviour of men and what they supposedly fantasize over.

I don't think I have a better term for it but something like"Chauvinist fantasy" would be a more precise term at least in this area.

I think that is a better term, perhaps...but can you think of an explicitly "male power fantasy" game (as the term is typically used) that is not also a "chauvinist fantasy game" (as you mean it)?

I also think people are more concerned about games because, well, it's kind of a new thing, it's not seen as art but as that thing we don't understand that young people do and so on. Don't think it has really much to do with games themselves.

I think it has a lot to do with the medium, its technical characteristics, and its history. It is a medium that emphasizes immersion, that was primarily marketed to kids for its first few decades, and which has for so long been a focus of entertainment-based controversy that the problem self-perpetuates.

[pepharytheworm]

I have played through significant portions of the games as I have many friends and relatives who own them. I have a tough time swallowing that this type of thing is "satire." The writing is terrible and lazy. It isn't intelligent and lacks any real social criticism. I see the satire label thrown around haphazardly (and sometimes retroactively) to explain away anything potentially offensive. "Oh you mean you weren't smart enough to realize you were ironically killing a hooker?"

That is called Hipster sexism or racism.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hipster_sexism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hipster_racism

[Erik_Twice]

I think that is a better term, perhaps...but can you think of an explicitly "male power fantasy" game (as the term is typically used) that is not also a "chauvinist fantasy game" (as you mean it)?

I feel the first term often includes the second, smaller one which is kind of my issue with it.

I think it has a lot to do with the medium, its technical characteristics, and its history. It is a medium that emphasizes immersion, that was primarily marketed to kids for its first few decades, and which has for so long been a focus of entertainment-based controversy that the problem self-perpetuates.

Oh, sure. What I mean is that I don't think the discussion really goes to the root of interactiveness and how it changes artistic intent but simply lingers on ignorance and it being easy to cling to. I just don't think it's much differen than movies being more "damaging" because they were more life-like than theater.

[Opa Opa]

See what some of you don't realize is that beating a hooker to death in GTA isn't me projecting my misogynistic tendencies on a digital woman. It's actually an allegory of the feminist movement in Russia during the communist revolution.

[Erik_Twice]

That's an absurd reduction the falsely assumes the behaviour of a person engaged in fiction must represent his behaviour in the real world.