Depictions of Women in Gaming (and other related issues)

[StarSock64]

Gosh I really hate reading, but I'll try my best. I hope everyone else does too! Because text walls.

I'm actually going to start with this. I'm sure people are going to disagree with me, but I think it needs to be brought up.

Anyway, this is the statement; in any discussion of minority issues where you are not directly a part of that minority, your job is essentially to shut up and listen.
I know that sounds blunt, but that's only because it's so important, and because we're discussing female perspectives and experience here, I say that as someone who's job is to shut up and listen.
Obviously you can ask questions and if invited, to share your perspective, but the important thing is to make sure the experiences and feedback from the minority in question are the ones that are represented.

I actually hate this mentality. I understand why it happens, but that doesn't mean it's sensible. It sounds good on paper, and I used to think as much myself, but from what I've seen it's extremely poisonous and does more harm than good.

I'm gonna make it clear that anything I say is going to be about this mentality in general, and not about PZ. So if I use "you," it's just a general "you." Forum communication gets messy, so I have to cover my bases!

First of all, it's incredibly unfair. Yes, yes, check your privilege, that's important, sure. But it's not like anybody chose to be privileged.
OKAY
YES, I KNOW
PLEASE JUST HOLD ON, DON'T LOSE FAITH IN ME YET
I know, men don't need to be defended from big bad feminists. They should be aware and responsible. They're the ones who have power, you shouldn't trivialize feminism, blah blah blah.

That's not my point. I think my point is much more practical.
I've seen numerous instances where decent guys, rational guys even, have been completely shut down because feminists just don't want to hear dissenting opinion. It is not everyone on this planet's job to be aware of every problem on the planet. Blaming privileged people for not thinking about your problems, even after openly admitting they have no reason to, doesn't make sense.

It's totally great that you want to make them become more aware. It's frustrating when they don't get what you mean immediately. To you, their initial reaction of disagreeing with you is maddening. Here, you thought, is someone who was cool. But wow, they don't even think sexism is a problem? Only idiots don't think sexism is a problem. It's beyond apparent that it is. Thanks for contributing to the problem with your ignorance, not-so-cool guy.

But having an initial reaction that sexism isn't a problem doesn't even make them stupid or irrational. It's not their fault that they haven't been exposed. It just isn't. By blaming and shaming, you give them a reason not to listen to you. A fairly valid one, even. If they know you're not going to give them a chance, why should they even try? I don't know about you guys, but when I'm put in a situation where I'm told everything must be one-sided and I can only be talked at, I pretty much stop caring. Because it's useless to try. Because you made it that way! Getting people to stop caring about what you're trying to advocate is really bad!

I mean, I get it. I get angry. Lots of people have more serious reasons than me to get angry. It's hard to keep your patience. But I am so perplexed about how people are parading this as a good thing.

Personally, when I lose my cool and shut down the conversation, I feel bad about it. It's not something to be proud of. It's my weakness, and I need to work on it. It's frustrating to try to express your points, especially when you have to make the same ones over and over again, or when things get kind of abstract and it's hard to reveal your point even though you feel more certain than anything you're right because you've lived it. But God dang it, that's my problem. I can't just blame the entirety of males for my own lack of self control. That's ludicrous.

But other people seem to feel empowered by their "right" to get angry. Society should discourage sexism, certainly. But automatically going off on people when they even seem the slightest bit sexist isn't a very practical way of going about it.

While calm, I've made actual progress in discussions with people I've disagreed with wholly on some points. We've come to actual understandings! We might not agree with everything, but we usually end up revealing some cool stuff to each other. I don't think you should aim to make huge sweeping victories, no matter how correct you feel. It freaking sucks when your buddies think your point is wrong when you feel so right. It can be pretty offensive, even. But it's okay if someone doesn't see every issue as an issue. That's just a part of critical thinking. I don't know how you can preach tolerance and then be so intolerant. The bigger picture is more important, rather than every single individual issue.

When you can make someone feel similar on a general level or at least open them up to new possibilities, you've made a victory. When you've gained a greater understanding of how the other side feels and what reasons they have for feeling so, you've made a victory. When you start "othering" them, which is kind of ironic I might add, then you lose an opportunity to understand your audience and you cannot strategize accordingly. That's a loss.

I've never made progress by being angry about it. I've made the opposite of progress, because things get really tense and then nobody wants to talk or think about the problem anymore. Shaming people into feeling guilt or accusing people of being bad people because they don't agree with you or haven't come to a greater understanding yet shouldn't be your main goal. I know, there are some people who are total douchebags who won't even try to listen. And maybe those people do deserve to be shamed, because society shouldn't tolerate that kind of madness. The issue is that everyone who dissents at all gets caught in the cross-fire, including rational people who are decent and just have not yet heard anything convincing to change their minds.

Since I'm on the topic, another thing that's bothering me is that I've seen feminists (or other _ists) make points that are extremely faulty or at least questionable, but I almost never see other feminists criticize their points. Maybe I'm just not aware of the times that they do. If that is the case, though, it means that such criticisms are not very public, and that means that many other people are getting the same impression I am. I think that makes this worth bringing up.

Anyone who does try to criticize is automatically ostracized. It's ridiculous, because these issues definitely are not black-and-white enough that everyone should be forced to agree with every point. Sometimes the points are even basically wrong! There's no checks and balances, which I imagine is why I've seen so many people treat feminists as some kind of hivemind and automatically dismiss them as feminazis. And honestly, I don't think I can blame them that terribly much. I'm really sick of seeing people misrepresent things that matter to me, and then severely discouraging discussion of those same things.

Sorry for being massive, but I don't feel like there's a convincing way to be concise for this kind of thing. Anyway, onward to feminism!

I agree. I think Ivy looks ridiculous! And we should encourage more females into gaming. But at the same time I support the developers decision to make Ivy like that. It's a difficult thing.

You shouldn't, though. It's not only socially stupid, it's creatively stupid.
I'm so glad Soul Calibur came up because it's a really good example of being a horrible offender! Now, I'm gonna go ahead and say I'm not a huge SC fan, so maybe something that I say will be wrong. If that's the case, feel free to say so, but I don't think I'm too far off here.

Anyway, y'all need to understand that sexualized females need not always be the worst thing ever. As far as I'm concerned, it's all about context. That's why arguments about "well, what about when men are sexualized?" are typically irrelevant. They have a different context, both in the real world and often in-universe.

Putting a ~sexy~ girl in your game can be okay. I have more of a problem with it when:
1. It doesn't make sense for the character.
2. She's treated as the token girl, and ends up being the sole female representation.
3. There isn't enough variety in the cast of females.
4. The creator's intentions are distractingly transparent.
and possibly other things I can't think of right now. Like the whole sexualization of violence or whatever, but I'm going to leave that out for now.

Whether you think sexism is a problem or not, I dare to say that these points should strike creative minds as just being bad work. These types of things should be discouraged regardless of social context. These things don't bother me only as a female, but also as a fellow creator and audience member who is trying to pay money to enjoy quality work.

Ivy fits -at least- 1 and 4, but also possibly 3.
Ivy has A VOW OF CHASTITY. Was that a typo for chastitty, because something tells me that her outfit doesn't match her character at all. It doesn't really tell me anything, which is what character design is supposed to do. Her alternate outfits give me a much better picture of what her character is supposed to be like. So why are they alternate and not the main ones?
Which brings me to point 4, where the creator is only trying to shove boobs in your face instead of trying to make good character design. It's obnoxious. It's manipulative. It's bad work.



Sophitia, another SC character, has gotten more sexualized across the series. To be honest, the SC2 and SC3 designs don't even bother me that much. But SC4 doesn't even make sense. There is so much room for nipslip there. It completely undermines her appearance as a strong warrior. It's obnoxious and takes you out of the work. The only reason a creator would consciously make that decision (and any decent creator is very conscious of the changes they make!) is to pull in the preteen boys. If you think it's okay to lower your creative standards in some completely unnecessary attempt to appeal to the audience's -- or the creator's own -- sexual appetite, then I frankly question your presence on an art board.

You guys are right. There are girls who like that sort of sexy stuff, and there are girls like that in real life! The problem is with the current balance and quantity of these things. There is a depressingly low number of examples of "good" female characters. If there were simply more examples of good female characters in video games, then a few examples here and there of stupid booby games might not be so bad. Yes, "good" is very subjective. Whether or not Samus is good, for example, can be argued a million different ways. However, if there were just more examples, and a better variety of examples, and more skillful examples, then having those sorts of "arguably good arguably awful" characters isn't really so bad at all. That's part of variety. But as things stand, it just isn't there right now. I know that's an argument that begs for a lot of examples, but I've already written too much. I hope you at least feel open to this point, and if you want to explore it further, I don't think that's a bad thing, even if you're feeling skeptical!

Lack of variety and relatability in stuff I want to enjoy sucks. And it's not just a problem for females. Men probably enjoy having varied characters too! Despite what Tomb Raider's creators may say, I bet they also like relating with all sorts of characters, including girls. Not every character needs to be sympathetic, but like I said, it's all about context. In many contexts, there's a simple lack of good characterization. That's a good enough reason to encourage change and promote a more conscious awareness in creators. I could make a million appeals to societal effects, but for now I'm just going to settle for an appeal as to why you would want creators to pay more attention even without those considerations.

I sort of jumped around while writing this, so I hope it's coherent. I don't have time to proofread right now...But I hope I contributed some good things to think about!