Tropes Vs Women in Video Games, Somehow a Controversy? (+ general gender / video game discussion)

The short story is that Anita Sarkeesian of Feminist Frequency has started a Kickstarter to explore the stereotypes of females in video games. Or well, why not just hear it in her words?

I love playing video games but Im regularly disappointed in the limited and limiting ways women are represented. This video project will explore, analyze and deconstruct some of the most common tropes and stereotypes of female characters in games. The series will highlight the larger recurring patterns and conventions used within the gaming industry rather than just focusing on the worst offenders. Im going to need your help to make it happen!

The longer story is that because she is a self-proclaimed "feminist" (what this means in her case I'm really not sure, since everyone interprets this label differently when applying it to themselves) that anything she does somehow automatically becomes super controversial, and she has received rape threats and death threats and attempts to shut down this project from (primarily) male gamers. Because obviously if you disagree with feminism the way to get your point across is to tell a women she needs to be raped and murdered. (That was sarcasm, in case you missed it. This is not the correct way to express disagreement. At all.)

Personally I think that, all fears of succumbing to the feminist agenda aside (also sarcasm), projects like hers are necessary for the video game industry to truly mature. Gamers seem to love talking about the word "mature" a lot, so why do we rebel against actual maturity so much? I think that it's a good thing that she is sticking to her project, all threats aside. And whatever the case, it is ridiculous that people are fighting so hard to shut her up. Why not let her say what she has to say and if, after actually hearing it, you disagree with it, you are well within your rights to say something.

What do you guys think?

PS. As of this writing she has brought in $126,768 of her $6,000 Kickstarter goal. So things aren't completely dire. But this doesn't negate the abuse she has had to (and most likely will continue to) sustain just to get this project moving.

As of today this thread will be locked. What originally was meant to be a thread discussing the soon-to-be controversial Anita videos about female tropes in Video Games grew into something much more. We at Negative World absolutely love a good conversation and we will always encourage mature and respectful conversation. That said, the thread has had it's moments of polarization to the extreme in the past and recently. While at the moment I write this, the thread is rather calm,.. there has been a joint decision by the moderators of this site to close this particular thread down. The thread strayed way outside of the original bounds of it's intent. We have a different idea of how to frame this delicate and polarizing topic at Negative World.

For future installments of Anita's series we will either have a mod create a new official thread for it (as well as posting links to previous episodes) or we will use our already established Youtube Video thread. The latter could have easily been the original home for this thread if it wanted to. Discussion can continue as normal in the future thread but we ask to keep in mind that the topic should relate to Anita's videos and her message. Hear, analyze, and discuss that. This new location for this discussion will be established with the release of her next video. Please find patience till then.

Thank you from all of us at Negative World for understanding. ~ Negative World Moderation

There are a lot of different controversies going on right now surrounding women and video games. Attempted rape in the new Tomb Raider game, booth babes at E3, the Hitman "nuns" trailer, that woman who did the Ubisoft conference being trolled... All at the same time. And I don't think women are being treated worse this year by the industry in general than in other years, people just talk about it more. Which is definitely a good thing. The industry desperately needs to be more inclusive of women, I think the focus on hyperviolent shooters during the various E3 conferences have shown that.

Yeah, video games need more strong female leads like Sa...



Never mind.

Someone had to get this out of the way, now carry on.

I sort of wish I had followed on that Tomb Raider rape thing because having just read about it this morning here, this is definitely blown out of proportion. It sort of remembers me when Matt Casamassina was talking about Killer7's full blown out sex scene and how Jack Thompson went batshit insane back then cause of stuff like this. There was no sex scene and what he was talking about was fully clothed people with the woman dry humping a guy. Yes, that's a sex scene alright.

@VofEscaflowne

Some people here don't think highly of Jim Sterling but his take on the situation is hard to disagree with.

VofEscaflowne said:

I sort of wish I had followed on that Tomb Raider rape thing because having just read about it this moaning here, this is definitely blown out of proportion. It sort of remembers me when Matt Casamassina was talking about Killer7's full blown out sex scene and how Jack Thompson went batshit insane back then cause of stuff like this. There was no sex scene and what he was talking about was fully clothed people with the woman dry humping a guy. Yes, that's a sex scene alright.

I swear I read your post like this, unintentionally.

@Guillaume I kind of naturally rebel against accepting the "both sides are right and both sides are wrong" viewpoint, but that was very well written. Basically he seems to be saying don't instantly jump into an argument without actually trying to understand the other side of things.

@Guillaume

Well he explains both point of views well enough. I honestly don't care about the direction it's taken. It's a more serious tone on her being forced to survive such harsh conditions, whether it be from the environment itself or other humans, and how she becomes the person that she is. I'm comfortable with that and I've been a Tomb Raider fan since the beginning (though I haven't played the last console game). But one of the comments says it right too. Stick a woman in a video game and there will always be controversy it seems. It's such a rare occurrence these days anyway and any time they're portrayed as having some kind of human emotion, people will be there to pick on it.

I'm not sure what she's going to do with 100 grand, but I'm all for the study.

The Internet can really be a pathetic and scary place.