Jesus Christ! I never said that, nor implied it. I don’t know her, so I can’t judge her. I have absolutely no opinion on her, the person, either way. I’m sure she’s a nice person. Or not. It doesn’t really matter. My feeling on her, as an individual (positive, negative, or indifferent) have no bearing whatsoever on anything. I don’t even have an opinion on her opinion, her videos don’t interest me, really. I’m more interested in the cultural influence that these videos have, than the videos themselves. I’ve now stated 6000 times that she doesn’t matter, she, the creator, is completely irrelevant to the topic at hand. Only the works matter. Further, only the cultural reaction to those works matter.
Why the hell does everyone want to make this something PERSONAL about HER?! It is starting to get annoying. Though, I suppose it is ironic, considering the first reply I made on this topic here:
“One thing I dislike about her project is that it brings out the whole “you dislike Israel the country, therefore you are an antisemite and your argument is invalid” school of fallacy”.
And here we are, with people dragging the same fallacy in my direction.
I don’t know if her target audience is game developers, I rather doubt it since everything is on Youtube, is put in a very non-technical way, and rests on a very public kickstarter.
That’s exactly the point. I may think she is fundamentally correct and trying to do something useful, but the past experience for many people whose identity is tied to being a gamer is that every previous time someone has showed up saying things similar to what she’s been saying, it’s been an attack on something they care about, so they’re conditioned to treat it as an attack. The fact that she tends to come off a little bit belittling (aneurin_price’s response elsewhere in this thread is entirely about that; I wouldn’t even put it quite as strongly as they do), especially if you aren’t used to academic arguments, isn’t helping that situation.
Asking why lots of gamers are having so much trouble understanding the distinction is like asking why women who have been repeatedly assaulted act defensive around men who aren’t behaving aggressively. They’ve been conditioned to.
Note: I’m not drawing a value equivalence between identifying with your gender and identifying with gaming, or having your hobby villainized and getting sexually assaulted, I’m just using it as an analogy to give a more familiar frame of reference for the identity-based response. Also, since it has bearing on a couple people’s responses to me, I’m not making the argument for my own feelings, I’m a casual gamer at best, it’s not terribly important to my identity. I just recognize the pattern from other incidents about things people feel strongly about.
We really don’t. There was an article on this site about the racism in H.P.Lovecraft’s writing and about possibly removing his likeness from the World Fantasy Award. No medium is immune from criticism. Dealing with such criticism without resorting to death threats is part of being a functional adult human being.
Also, no offense, but The Last of Us is not The Road and Red Dead Redemption is no Blood Meridian.
Ahh, thanks aneurin. I remember it now. And know why it didn’t stick in my memory. I kneed the creep in the balls, bit his neck, and then shot him straight up. Just one of many creeps my character had to deal with. With a much less creepy setting than some of the other scenes.
And thanks also for the link to Ellie Gibson’s excellent article on the controversy. Both she and Rhianna Pratchett offered calm, reasoned insights into the games’ story, and particularly into Lara’s arc. Gibson’s concluding paragraph (I haven’t seen the trailer so I’m relying on her reporting of its content) addresses the issue of gratuitous sex in game with less histrionics and much more aplomb than Sarkeesian ever will.
And like I’ve previously said, more female protagonists, more female antagonists, and less sex in games generally. Seriously, who needs the distraction? Just bring on the bad guys (whether they be male or female).
Yet somehow, we have people who have a nice sit down to shake off being shot a few dozen times so they can run 30 miles per hour, ignore chain of command with impunity, are able to tote around a dozen weapons… and somehow this is allowed to pass the “realism” filter, but female soldiers don’t?
So you won’t buy a game because it features a scene where the female protagonist fights off a creep who appears to imply that he intends to sexually assault her (He never actually does - just talks about his sister and how she was also a bitch) because you can’t deal with the odious content but you are quite happy to play when you get it for free? Really, that’s how it works for you?
aneurin_price linked the YouTube video of this scene, together with an excellent article by Ellie Gibson, which featured an interview with the game’s author, Rhianna Pratchett. You should read it.
And why should the fact that I don’t remember a short (for me) scene where a sleezebag trapped a girl against a tree, making vague threats until she killed him, stick in my mind any more than countless other scenes where Lara killed baddie after baddie? I notice that you didn’t think it worth mentioning that the sleezebag shoots dead one of the male prisoners who tries to escape at the beginning of the scene. Why? Because the implied threat of sexual violence is worse than death? You should be clapping your hands when she knees him in the balls, whooping with delight when she bites a chunk from his neck, and high fiving yourself when she shoots the bastard in the face, rather then playing the scene with eyes half closed.
Yes, I think it might have been too complicated for all of us. Fortunate that the world has you to make connections like this and to get people’s names right.
You realise that trolls are getting off on this attention, right? It’s their intention and they derive a perverse sense of satisfaction at being called names because it’s a perceived confirmation that their flaming has offended.
“r— you until you’re d—”
^This is the wisdom of the kind of people you are publicising. Sometimes it’s better to ignore the trolls and let authorities deal with the actual crimes they are committing, then publicise the fact that their idiotic asses have been thrown in jail.
I have been playing games for a very, very long time. As a gamer in my upper 30s, I can say that Anita’s videos are among the best I have seen with respect to the video game genre. There is a very dark truth to our industry. A lot of the games we have played have been developed by men who are anti-social and don’t have good relationships with women in real life. Certaintly, this doesn’t characterize all developers, but it definitely captures a good amount. While people can argue all day about portions of games being grouped together to prove a point, it doesn’t change the fact that these images exist. They exist in a number of games I have played and I have never thought about them until now. Call me a white knight or accuse me of white knighting all day. I don’t care. We need some type of change. At the very least, these conversations needs to be brought to the forefront. Social changes does indeed take time and there are plenty of people who are resistant to this change. But this is where it starts!
Ah yes Forbes, the same outlet who 3 months ago proclaimed that Iggy Azalea runs the entire rap game, then after the fallout furiously backpedalled the title of their article, revising it to say that Iggy is just ‘the next big thing’ in hip hop.
Right, how could we not take something from Forbes seriously.
I am in my mid-30s and I have played just about every video game presented in the footage of her videos. I remember a number of the images and the advertisements. I feel Anita’s work is extremely well researched and would play a valuable role in the teaching of video game history. The images in her video are real and do not appear manipulated. I recall seeing many of them with my own eyes in gameplay.
I question why so many developers have programmed pimps and prostitutes and strip clubs and graphic depictions of violence against women in their games? Where does this stem from? Is it repressed anger? Does this come from men who have never had good relationships with women? Do the men at these development studios (who represent the vast majority of developers) think this is what other men need to see? Do devs feel we need strip club training?
Does my thirteen year-old need to learn that a stripper might go with them at the end of the night if they touch her enough times during a lap dance to raise her enjoyment meter while the bouncer is not watching?
I think it is fantastic that you can take time out to provide an easy-to-understand guide of the arguments of Anita’s detractors. It is like an excerpt from “Debate for Dummies.”
But what about the issues in gaming? The issues that are not reflective of Anita as a person? The issues that your kids are probably being exposed to while you are on the internet being a smart ass?
