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Anita Sarkeesian: 'What I Couldn't Say'

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I'd rather critically examine the contents of a game with fanservice, the cultural implications of those choices or otherwise rather than turn it off. Cutting out something from your understanding because reasons seems sort of needlessly exclusionary to me, even if I disagree with it or are embarrassed by it.

For an example, since someone brought up danganronpa 2 (i havent played it but i've seen one scene) lets say that a particular scene with a girl and deserts(i think it was sweets ) in a very very provocative pose. The toggle fan service button would blacken(HA) the screen so you dont get an image but still get the dialog. Girl is a student so yeah.. a minor (I am not touching that discussion with a 10 ft pole since that discussion is very toxic to my health and has the same amount of reactions a GG thread would have)
 
That's not what he's saying. All he's saying is that there's nothing wrong with the objectification of women. The solution here is to have more objectification of men, not less objectification of women. Humans are sexual creatures and there's nothing wrong with that.

Buncha puritans up in here.

Exactly. Modern day Hollywood is an industry that's pumping out plenty of sex for both and it's great
 
We are getting Magic Mike XXL and 50 Shades of Grey in the same year. 2 massive sex fantasies aimed squarely at women.

Please don't argue with me that women are unfairly sexualizd in current holywood in comparison to men. It's blatantly false. Both are sexed up a ton.

...compared to how many pieces of media aimed at straight, white males? You are greatly minimizing the actual prevalence of all this.

This isn't a zero-sum game. Equal opportunity sexism doesn't fix the problem any more than sending death threats to men in equal proportions to women.
 
That's not what he's saying. All he's saying is that there's nothing wrong with the objectification of women. The solution here is to have more objectification of men, not less objectification of women. Humans are sexual creatures and there's nothing wrong with that.

Buncha puritans up in here.

Nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope. Objectification is bad. because of the word OBJECT
 
For an example, since someone brought up danganronpa 2 (i havent played it but i've seen one scene) lets say that a particular scene with a girl and deserts(i think it was sweets ) in a very very provocative pose. The toggle fan service button would blacken(HA) the screen so you dont get an image but still get the dialog.
That sounds really dumb to me but as long as its something you opt into/out of I'm fine with it existing and being something I can just ignore.
 
Nobody has said that "sex is bad" and you are trying to paint people here as being all "uppity prudes" when that's not what people are complaining about.

Nobody here is complaining about sex and sexuality in and of itself. You have to understand that not everyone gets off to the same things you get off on, and you doubly need to understand just how exclusionary and simultaneously prevalent tactic is a problem for those wanting to try to get into gaming but aren't into this stuff.

It's only targeted at one group, yes. And it's practically the only group that has been targeted by game publishers and developers over the years. You need to understand just how truly pandered to us guys are in the media.

I don't understand the use of the word exclusionary here. Is containing content someone doesn't enjoy 'exclusionary'? Are westerns exclusionary to me because I don't like the setting? Are superhero movies exclusionary because I don't like the premise of cape films or seeing beautiful men with huge arms and rippling abs?

If a game has content, including sexual content, that you don't like, that just means you don't like it. It's not excluding you based on anything but your own taste, and that's fine. That's how different tastes, niches and genres form.

Also, how on earth can you say that only one group has been targeted by developers? Sports games are played by everyone. The Wii and DS happened - casual gaming happened. The smartphone gaming industry is happening. Indie games and kickstarter happened. As someone reminded me earlier in the thread, we've never, ever had more releases per year or more different niches and tastes catered to.

Now, more than ever before, the industry is able to have a few uber-sexy games because if that's not your thing then there's 1000s more games you could try. And at the same time people like me who DO like the sexy stuff from time to time also get our fix. It all checks out to me.

Where there's a problem is outright sexism in narrative, imo. Like Other M. That's where I draw the line.

Nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope. Objectification is bad. because of the word OBJECT

Assuming that's not scarcasm, we'll have to disagree on this one. Objectification is a natural part of human sexuality, and there's nothing wrong with it at all when you are removed from interaction with a person. Seeing someone from a distance, or on a screen and objectifying their body - totally fine.
 
Exactly. Modern day Hollywood is an industry that's pumping out plenty of sex for both and it's great

...so, you think it's perfectly acceptable to treat or portray women as objects? And the solution is to portray men as simple objects?

This isn't a zero sum game, dude.
 
...compared to how many pieces of media aimed at straight, white males? You are greatly minimizing the actual prevalence of all this.

This isn't a zero-sum game. Equal opportunity sexism doesn't fix the problem any more than sending death threats to men in equal proportions to women.
Equal opportunity sexism because there are movies with beautiful people of both sexes willingly taking their clothes off.

I mean how deep does this rabbit hole go? Am I supposed to feel bad about watching porn as well?


...so, you think it's perfectly acceptable to treat or portray women as objects? And the solution is to portray men as simple objects?

This isn't a zero sum game, dude.

If they are willingly doing it then, yes? Hence porn
 
Nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope. Objectification is bad. because of the word OBJECT

You can take that up with our DNA then. When I hit puberty and discovered pornography on the Internet I didn't masturbate because I was emotionally attracted to the porn stars' personalities. I masturbated because the images of their naked bodies getting pounded made me feel funny, like climbing the rope in gym class.

"Objectification" is hard wired into us. It's how we experience physical attraction.
 
That sounds really dumb to me but as long as its something you opt into/out of I'm fine with it existing and being something I can just ignore.

Its something they do to most Visual novels for console releases, such as Fate stay night for example since there is a sex scene, (the consoles couldnt have that) they blackened the screen and took out a little dialog and made the game available without that sort of thing (i cant call it fan service since it wasnt supposed to be interpreted as such)
 
The film industry is much smarter and more adaptive to how they pander/market. It's not even limited to gender. I've read the industry rags that talk about how they will market to the growing Hispanic population of the US in the future since data finds that Hispanic families still enjoy going to the movies while others stay home.

Though the actual content is sometimes pretty derivative (sequels, remakes etc.), Hollywood also better understands that they need more than just the hetero white male to buy a ticket.

Funnily, it has been proven again and again that Hispanics are some of the biggest groups, which consume videogames.
http://www.latintimes.com/hispanic-...ses-and-plays-more-video-games-general-203557

Equal opportunity sexism because there are movies with beautiful people of both sexes willingly taking their clothes off.

I mean how deep does this rabbit hole go? Am I supposed to feel bad about watching porn as well?




If they are willingly doing it then, yes? Hence porn

This is a thread about a woman, sharing the hate she received, for critizing videogames. You want to talk about porn.
 
How many of you know here watch porn.

Porn is literally objectifying the participants.

It is nothing else.


What do your personal habits have to do with anything here, other than fodder for you to set up straw men?

Straw man because we are talking about sex and enjoying it? These kinds of threads are waaaay more intense than I thought they were
 
You can take that up with our DNA then. When I hit puberty and discovered pornography on the Internet I didn't masturbate because I was emotionally attracted to the porn stars' personalities. I masturbated because the images of their naked bodies getting pounded made me feel funny, like climbing the rope in gym class.

"Objectification" is hard wired into us. It's how we experience physical attraction.

You can still lust and not see people as objects (that's where the word Objectification comes from). I think you guys are using the word incorrectly.
 
I wonder why more women don't take part in video game discussions.

What is this apropos of? The last page has been a perfectly civil discussion, no? Are you implying that many women would be upset by this honest exchange of views? I disagree wholly, but maybe I don't understand.
 
How is questioning people's personal sexual information relevant to Anita Sarkesian again? You're really embarrassing yourself here.

Because the topic has turned to an overall sex convo and objectification.

I'm not embarrassing myself at all, the entire last several pages of posts have been about this
 
What is this apropos of? The last page has been a perfectly civil discussion, no? Are you implying that many women would be upset by this honest exchange of views? I disagree wholly, but maybe I don't understand.

No it hasn't. I would call the rubber stamping of people as "puritans" to be a bunch of anti-intellectual bullshit of the most laughable kind.
 
How many of you know here watch porn.

Porn is literally objectifying the participants.

It is nothing else.

This is a thread about a woman sharing her suffering from harassers, who harassed her for critizing videogames, in the videogames section of a videogames forum. You want to talk about porn. Care to tell why?
 
I don't understand the use of the word exclusionary here. Is containing content someone doesn't enjoy 'exclusionary'? Are westerns exclusionary to me because I don't like the setting? Are superhero movies exclusionary because I don't like the premise of cape films or seeing beautiful men with huge arms and rippling abs?

It's not a matter of what someone does and does not enjoy. It's a matter of what's actually out there already.

When a vast, vast majority of media is created for the presumed straight, white male, then yes, it's exclusionary by virtue of the fact that other demographics don't even exist to the marketer's eyes.

If a game has content, including sexual content, that you don't like, that just means you don't like it. It's not excluding you based on anything but your own taste, and that's fine. That's how different tastes, niches and genres form.

Yes, and a good portion of media, a good majority of media, is directed towards having sexual content aimed at the presumed straight male demographic. There are entire swathes of people out there that could be equally pandered to, but it does not occur.

Some people have started coming out and asking for developers and publishers to consider them when they create their games and consider what they might want in representations of characters. They have been responded to with vile, vicious harassment, as if asking for slightly more diverse representations of characters would somehow take away the very niche and genres that are already perfectly pandered to them.

Also, how on earth can you say that only one group has been targeted by developers? Sports games are played by everyone. The Wii and DS happened - casual gaming happened. The smartphone gaming industry is happening. Indie games and kickstarter happened. As someone reminded me earlier in the thread, we've never, ever had more releases per year or more different niches and tastes catered to.

A vast majority o the blockbuster, mainstream games that are put out there are the one that make the big bucks. GTa series, CoD series, Battlefield series, Ass Creed, whatever's pumped out by EA or Ubisoft.

And keep in mind, these changes are happening because more people are speaking out about these sorts of issues. It wasn't something that just occured.

Now, more than ever before, the industry is able to have a few uber-sexy games because if that's not your thing then there's 1000s more games you could try. And at the same time people like me who DO like the sexy stuff from time to time also get our fix. It all checks out to me.

Where there's a problem is outright sexism in narrative, imo. Like Other M. That's where I draw the line.

Yeah. Again, nobody here has ever said that they, de facto, do not want sex or sexuality in games. Nobody's attacking your precious sexy stuff that you like from time to time. What we are attacking is the overbearing prevalence of the stuff that, despite your claims, are continually pushed on us all the time.
 
There's always going to be a market for any kind of game. Keep in mind, I write video game criticism, so when I say "I think fighting games have a sexuality problem," I don't mean "BAN DOA IT IS THE WORST."

I think DOA is particularly interesting, actually, because DOA5 clearly tried to make an attempt to be taken it a bit more seriously. The slogan for the game was "I'm a Fighter!" and Mila, a short-haired MMA fighter with a not-totally-unrealistic build and a t-shirt and jeans as her main outift, as the new game's poster child.

And then none of that got nearly as much attention as the barbie doll dress up and boobs. So they went back to what sells and that's why we got Nyotengu and Rachel and, sigh, Marie Rose. And I guess, you know, whatever. If that's what the audience wants, that's what the audience wants.

But I think it's fascinating that the DOA community is trying to shirk that baggage and want the game to be taken seriously at the same time Tecmo is pushing hard on the sexual aspects of it, so there are clearly multiple groups that want different things from that series.

It's up to developers and publishers to decide what audience matters to them. No one is going to get what they want 100% of the time and, well, pointing out what you think is problematic and wanting it to change is no different from not buying a game unless it caters to the types of things that arouse you. I think Capcom went one direction with SF, I think it looks like MKX is cleaning up its act, I think DOA went the opposite direction.

Things are fluid.

I've been reading about some of that lately since I read that interview with Itagaki. Team Ninja has really gone far out there with costumes and the almost nude characters since Itagaki's departure. It's really strange how they've handled the series.
 
How many of you know here watch porn.

Porn is literally objectifying the participants.

It is nothing else.
That actually depends on the video in question: there's a major difference between objectification and nudity/sex. It's more to do with framing than content.

And I'm not going into detail because it's probably against the TOS.
 
This is a thread about a woman sharing her suffering from harassers, who harassed her for critizing videogames, in the videogames section of a videogames forum. You want to talk about porn. Care to tell why?

Some of you are way too intense.

So I defend Anita, start having a generalized discussion of the portrayal of sex and women in media since the convo naturally flows that way,and now you guys want to attack me just because I'm saying I'm down with sex in media.

I mean what?
 
Saw the video in the OP and another someone posted on this page....just, damn :(.

I just don't get why people cannot have free speech and express their opinions in a civil manner without going "You bad, here are the threats!?!"; just makes humanity in general so primitive and narrow minded :(.

Hearing the stories about what Anita goes through on a daily basis, her admitting she can't be human anymore because of the backlash, and that video of comments/statements women in the gaming industry have wanted to say but couldn't due to the almost hellish nature of the online web; just not right at all X(.

Regarding her videos, she makes some great points and while I wish she would explain her examples more (like in one video she mentions how beating/killing hookers in GTAV is bad; yes it is bad, so what would you do about it? What could be done to make it better? Does it even fit in the games 'realistic' world? But she moves on to the next example and so on), she makes great points regardless and it is fantastic that the industry is taking steps in somewhat fixing that (a lot of the females in newer AAA games and tons of indie games are more modest and are much better in female representation; it was cool that the Towerfall devs had an Anitia skin in the game to honor her work :)).

This whole debate and arguement just shows how communicating on the online web is a dangerous double edged sword; on one hand, it can stimulate fantastic communities that can be great places to be a part of (the PSN Thread for example :D; great place with fantastic Gaffers giving great suggestions on games and offer nice discussions overall :)). On the other hand......we have the 'dark' side of the web, with people using it as a 'mask' to torment people for their simple enjoyment. I find that this video explains that very, very well.

I just wish things would be better for everyone regarding communicating with the internet, so the more people speak out against the 'trolls' and finally stop the hate out there.


How is that worse than hitting/killing any other innocent entity in that game?

i personally don't like the way she portrays certain games.
But indeed, it's a shame that people cant keep the discussion civil.
 
This is a thread about a woman sharing her suffering from harassers, who harassed her for critizing videogames, in the videogames section of a videogames forum. You want to talk about porn. Care to tell why?

Because people are making arguments that sexual objectification is bad under any circumstance. Pornography is quite literally sexual objectification, and something that I think many (if not most) of NeoGAF's members, uh, "utilize" on at least a semi-regular basis.
 
Equal opportunity sexism because there are movies with beautiful people of both sexes willingly taking their clothes off.

I mean how deep does this rabbit hole go? Am I supposed to feel bad about watching porn as well?




If they are willingly doing it then, yes? Hence porn

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Okay, I think we've hit a wall here. This thread has veered around the topic, so I'm going to do my best to just not contribute to the bloating of the thread anymore.

I wonder why more women don't take part in video game discussions.

I couldn't have the slightest idea.
 
We are getting Magic Mike XXL and 50 Shades of Grey in the same year. 2 massive sex fantasies aimed squarely at women.

Please don't argue with me that women are unfairly sexualizd in current holywood in comparison to men. It's blatantly false. Both are sexed up a ton.

Two movies that pander to female audiences suddenly justify an entire industry that bases its tentpole strategy on appealing to straight, white men?

Seriously, dude? Is this like some performance art trolling?

I'm not embarrassing myself at all, the entire last several pages of posts have been about this

I wouldn't be so sure about that.
 
Some of you are way too intense.

So I defend Anita, start having a generalized discussion of the portrayal of sex and women in media since the convo naturally flows that way,and now you guys want to attack me just because I'm saying I'm down with sex in media.

I mean what?
You are incredibly misrepresenting positions here
 
Some of you are way too intense.

So I defend Anita, start having a generalized discussion of the portrayal of sex and women in media since the convo naturally flows that way,and now you guys want to attack me just because I'm saying I'm down with sex in media.

I mean what?

Sex is great and I can recall other posts echoing that sentiment. Care to point out posts which said sex isn't great?

Edit:And, while we are at it, why its relevant for the topic at hand?
 
Some of you are way too intense.

So I defend Anita, start having a generalized discussion of the portrayal of sex and women in media since the convo naturally flows that way,and now you guys want to attack me just because I'm saying I'm down with sex in media.

I mean what?

Yo I am perfectly fine with sex in media. Honestly don't care either way as long as its acceptable to show every side of it.
 
Some of you are way too intense.

So I defend Anita, start having a generalized discussion of the portrayal of sex and women in media since the convo naturally flows that way,and now you guys want to attack me just because I'm saying I'm down with sex in media.

I mean what?

Misrepresenting arguments, straw men, bringing up porn as some sort of "point" in a thread about Anita.

You're talking a lot but not really saying anything.
 
From my personal experience police really don't care about civil cases of harassment, im not sure if Anita is broadly trying to get FBI to look at every troll or just the serious cases, but seems like would be like trying to push a boulder up a hill.
 
Sexualized things is something gaf has a hard time discussing buddy, trust me if there is one thing on gaf you dont want to do besides a GG thread, is something with sex and games (people get way too heated and emotional over that discussion and both sides are hard to reason with the other)

This post was fucking prophetic.

Anyways guys I'm bouncing. This is the first Anita / Gamer Gate thread I've ever been in and had no idea shit got this real here.

Anyways respect to all of you and your opinions. I'll see you all soon, in another thread, hopefully talking about something a little more tame. :-)
 
Misrepresenting arguments, straw men, bringing up porn as some sort of "point" in a thread about Anita.

You're talking a lot but not really saying anything.

It sounds like he's saying he doesn't have a problem with having sexy portrayals of women in video games and three or four people are throwing a shitfit over it.
 
Misrepresenting arguments, straw men, bringing up porn as some sort of "point" in a thread about Anita.

You're talking a lot but not really saying anything.

I feel like that's exactly what you're doing... making a bunch of dismissive replies and dancing around counter-arguments by questioning their relevancy. If they're irrelevant then please, explain why. Simply dismissing them as not being relevant won't bring about the change you want to see in the world. You're gonna have to change people's minds to do that.
 
It sounds like he's saying he doesn't have a problem with having sexy portrayals of women in video games and three or four people are throwing a shitfit over it.

It sounds like The Shogun is doing what he does best: turn a discussion toward himself and the confounding nonsense that he attempts to convey here.

I feel like that's exactly what you're doing... making a bunch of dismissive replies and dancing around counter-arguments by questioning their relevancy. If they're irrelevant then please, explain why. Simply dismissing them as not being relevant won't bring about the change you want to see in the world. You're gonna have to change people's minds to do that.

You childishly rubber stamped many people in here as puritans so pardon me if I don't take your advice about dismissive behavior.
 
How is that worse than hitting/killing any other innocent entity in that game?

i personally don't like the way she portrays certain games.
But indeed, it's a shame that people cant keep the discussion civil.

Because sex workers are notoriously powerless and disenfranchised in real life. There is real risk of violence and disease in their daily work and they have little legal or financial protection.

Compare that to someone else higher in the socioeconomic ladder. I couldn't give a shit how many lawyers get run over or shot in GTA or any other game because I remain significantly richer and more powerful than the majority of people playing those games. I also enjoy far greater protections under state apparatus. Sex workers don't enjoy those same privileges.
 
You childishly rubber stamped many people in here as puritans so pardon me if I don't take your advice about dismissive behavior.

...because that's how I see them, and I explained why that is. If you feel I'm wrong about that, then again, I'm all ears.
 
It sounds like The Shogun is doing what he does best: turn a discussion toward himself and the confounding nonsense that he attempts to convey here.

Honest question, because I'm just jumping in at the middle of this - is it okay for women in video games to be "sexy?" Because I really can't tell if half of the posts in here are serious.
 
Sex appeal can absolutely hit unappealing extremes. I'm playing Danganronpa 2 now and I get actively turned off to the game whenever it delves into its odd (though frequent) moments of fanservice. As in, a character trips and her dress hikes up over her head with and she is tied up spread eagle on the floor. I know who that's supposed to appeal to, but to me, it's so clearly designed to elicit a sexual reaction from me that I can't help but just shake my head.

This, I think, is an example of an unappealing extreme. Like, let's agree that there's a difference between a sexy movie, like, say, Last Tango in Paris, and softcore stuff on Cinemax. Adding elements from the latter to the former, even though they're meant to elicit similar feelings of arousal, is just corny and awkward and can ruin something in totality. Video games have not figured this line between sexy and cinemax out yet. So they just throw the Cinemax on top, because why not?

Not all sex appeal is created equally and the rush to an extreme is, as I said, gross.
Have you considered that some of these games are actually just equivalent to the softcore cinemax flicks from your example?

Do you find those cinemax movies gross?
 
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