Feminism

[Fatherted 129]

^Of course we would get a response like this. No reason whatsoever.

Rape is a violent crime like any other. It is only the societal stigma that rape is worse than paralysis or a stabbing that causes attitudes like this. There is no rape culture. Telling the victim to be strong and helping them live their life instead of squashing them with the weight of their pain is surely the best way to give a great big middle finger to the rapist instead of letting them ruin your life.

This rampant self-pity is what perpetuates a rape culture. Letting the rapist beat you is how we encourage rape. If feminists encouraged women (and men) to be strong and beat the rapist instead of telling them that they should hate the rapist and all of his kind and they will never get past their experience.

You don't help women by making them a permanent victim, you know. People online think they are feminists fighting for equality, but they are fighting with weak points and outdated points of view. If you really wanted to kill rape culture, you would stop making rape a crime more special than murder or violence.

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

See, this is what feminists rile against when it comes to rape. Being told that rape is not such a big deal, that it could have been worse, that they can just walk it off, by a bunch of guys who have never been raped or assaulted and have literally no idea what it feels like. Its just one tad more stupid and insulting than telling people with clinical depression to 'laugh it off and cheer up'. 

 

But no surprise here really, its just another aspect of rape culture, the bit that trivializes rape, usually done by people who have no experience with it whatsoever. 

The lack of understanding of where this discussion has gone is clearly evident.

 

While no one denies the seriousness of rape, it is really not any different from any other assault and battery offense.  The perpetrator, male or female, is sick and needs help.  The victim needs reassurance and in some cases access to a very early abortion.  When rape is really violent, then let the law take its course.

 

The problem with the feminist cause is that they believe only women can be raped.

[Fatherted 129]

I just read a Eurogamer article about how the editor is sexist.

The only thing that annoyed me was, how the heck did that get onto a gaming journalism website? It's not a place to vent your personal feelings. You have Tumblr for that, and I would go there if I wanted philosophical discussions of sexism. It's an issue which butts into places it shouldn't be. If I go to Eurogamer I go to read about games. It's like discussing racism on a gourmet food website.

[krbe 193]

The "article" is the editor's blog, which is the place for "venting personal feelings". The electronic cat database is not made up of different services catering to the content-in-question, but facilitates the access to whatever you choose to allow online access to.

Simtropolis is a SimCity website; how the heck does feminism get on there? You can go rant about feminism in a Tumblr post.

[AkemiAzula 280]

Personally im a worst case scenario pessimistic. I have always felt its better to shout at specks of dirt rather than say shell be right and witness an ever growing layer of filth.

So suggesting we stop telling victims theyve been through hell strikes me as not helping fight the issue. There are few acts more wicked and to see both the public and the law beat around the bush and avoid harsher discipline in society...

However i am in no way suggesting victims be prevented from bouncing back. But lets admit theyve every right to uphold the grievance.

[mrsmartman 200]

The issue of Feminism depends on culture. Forced sex is less prevalent in places with fewer parties. Feminism would be more about social status and equal opportunity.

[LexusInfernus 908]

^Of course we would get a response like this. No reason whatsoever.

Rape is a violent crime like any other. It is only the societal stigma that rape is worse than paralysis or a stabbing that causes attitudes like this. There is no rape culture. Telling the victim to be strong and helping them live their life instead of squashing them with the weight of their pain is surely the best way to give a great big middle finger to the rapist instead of letting them ruin your life.

This rampant self-pity is what perpetuates a rape culture. Letting the rapist beat you is how we encourage rape. If feminists encouraged women (and men) to be strong and beat the rapist instead of telling them that they should hate the rapist and all of his kind and they will never get past their experience.

You don't help women by making them a permanent victim, you know. People online think they are feminists fighting for equality, but they are fighting with weak points and outdated points of view. If you really wanted to kill rape culture, you would stop making rape a crime more special than murder or violence.

*sigh* where to start.

 

First, feminists do not turn rape victims into sad pitiful victims who are totally defined by what happened to them. You are putting words into a whole movements mouth, don't do that. Second, rape culture is not perpetuated by 'self pitying' of victims. Do you even know what rape culture means?  Third, yes there is a rape culture. The proof is everywhere, from the extremely low conviction rate, to the systemic victim blaming, to the trivializing of rape as 'just another assault crime'. Which is why your idea that you can kill rape culture by stop making it special both flawed and correct at the same time. Its correct that rape culture would disappear if it gets treated like any other crime. Its flawed because you assume that already happens everywhere outside feminist circles, which again, is clearly not the case if we look at the evidence. Again, rape gets trivialized by people, the victim and not the attacker gets the brunt of the blame for the crime, the police in far to many cases doesn't bother to go after rapists (evidenced by the huge rape kit backlog in a bunch of major cities) and when they do get taken to court, the conviction rate is ridiculously low. 

 

If feminists talk about rape culture, they talk about how rape culture prevents rape from being treated like other severe crimes and what they want in the end is that rape gets treated like those other crimes by society and the justice system. 

 

The problem with the feminist cause is that they believe only women can be raped.

 

Wow, that is not what feminists are saying about rape at all. Quite the opposite in fact. 

 

I just read a Eurogamer article about how the editor is sexist.

The only thing that annoyed me was, how the heck did that get onto a gaming journalism website? It's not a place to vent your personal feelings. You have Tumblr for that, and I would go there if I wanted philosophical discussions of sexism. It's an issue which butts into places it shouldn't be. If I go to Eurogamer I go to read about games. It's like discussing racism on a gourmet food website.

Its relevant because the game industry is know for its rampant sexism at nearly every level. 

 

Just look how underrepresented female characters are in games. Most protagonists are (white) guys, if they are girls they are very often sexualized to ridiculous degrees (Lara Croft before the remake, armor in fantasy games that look more like skimpy bikinis than armor). More often than not, the female characters in games are robbed of all their agency and basically become the 'price' for beating the game. Oh sure, we then get that standard argument that 'games are made for boys'. One, that is just not true at all. Literally half of the people that buy games are women. And second, its nonsense to suggest that boys only play games if they have male leads in them. I'm pretty sure that if the game is good, most people don't give a damn about whether they play as male or female. Only the most sad and insecure people will feel threatened in their sexuality if they have to play a game as a female character. 

 

And that was just what happens inside games. Working as a female game developer in the games industry is not any better. Sexism on the workfloor happens all to often, resulting in a toxic work environment, complaints either do not get handled or result in the person making the complaint being 'blacklisted' as some hysterical broad who can't handle a simple 'joke' or something (which, given how often game developers have to switch from studio can be a real problem for future employment). No sir, the games industry is not a happy place to work as a woman. 

 

So yeah, discussing sexism in the games industry media is very relevant. 

[BLANKBLANK 4,414]

 

^Of course we would get a response like this. No reason whatsoever.

Rape is a violent crime like any other. It is only the societal stigma that rape is worse than paralysis or a stabbing that causes attitudes like this. There is no rape culture. Telling the victim to be strong and helping them live their life instead of squashing them with the weight of their pain is surely the best way to give a great big middle finger to the rapist instead of letting them ruin your life.

This rampant self-pity is what perpetuates a rape culture. Letting the rapist beat you is how we encourage rape. If feminists encouraged women (and men) to be strong and beat the rapist instead of telling them that they should hate the rapist and all of his kind and they will never get past their experience.

You don't help women by making them a permanent victim, you know. People online think they are feminists fighting for equality, but they are fighting with weak points and outdated points of view. If you really wanted to kill rape culture, you would stop making rape a crime more special than murder or violence.

*sigh* where to start.

 

First, feminists do not turn rape victims into sad pitiful victims who are totally defined by what happened to them. You are putting words into a whole movements mouth, don't do that. Second, rape culture is not perpetuated by 'self pitying' of victims. Do you even know what rape culture means?  Third, yes there is a rape culture. The proof is everywhere, from the extremely low conviction rate, to the systemic victim blaming, to the trivializing of rape as 'just another assault crime'. Which is why your idea that you can kill rape culture by stop making it special both flawed and correct at the same time. Its correct that rape culture would disappear if it gets treated like any other crime. Its flawed because you assume that already happens everywhere outside feminist circles, which again, is clearly not the case if we look at the evidence. Again, rape gets trivialized by people, the victim and not the attacker gets the brunt of the blame for the crime, the police in far to many cases doesn't bother to go after rapists (evidenced by the huge rape kit backlog in a bunch of major cities) and when they do get taken to court, the conviction rate is ridiculously low. 

 

If feminists talk about rape culture, they talk about how rape culture prevents rape from being treated like other severe crimes and what they want in the end is that rape gets treated like those other crimes by society and the justice system. 

 

The problem with the feminist cause is that they believe only women can be raped.

 

Wow, that is not what feminists are saying about rape at all. Quite the opposite in fact. 

 

I just read a Eurogamer article about how the editor is sexist.

The only thing that annoyed me was, how the heck did that get onto a gaming journalism website? It's not a place to vent your personal feelings. You have Tumblr for that, and I would go there if I wanted philosophical discussions of sexism. It's an issue which butts into places it shouldn't be. If I go to Eurogamer I go to read about games. It's like discussing racism on a gourmet food website.

Its relevant because the game industry is know for its rampant sexism at nearly every level. 

 

Just look how underrepresented female characters are in games. Most protagonists are (white) guys, if they are girls they are very often sexualized to ridiculous degrees (Lara Croft before the remake, armor in fantasy games that look more like skimpy bikinis than armor). More often than not, the female characters in games are robbed of all their agency and basically become the 'price' for beating the game. Oh sure, we then get that standard argument that 'games are made for boys'. One, that is just not true at all. Literally half of the people that buy games are women. And second, its nonsense to suggest that boys only play games if they have male leads in them. I'm pretty sure that if the game is good, most people don't give a damn about whether they play as male or female. Only the most sad and insecure people will feel threatened in their sexuality if they have to play a game as a female character. 

 

And that was just what happens inside games. Working as a female game developer in the games industry is not any better. Sexism on the workfloor happens all to often, resulting in a toxic work environment, complaints either do not get handled or result in the person making the complaint being 'blacklisted' as some hysterical broad who can't handle a simple 'joke' or something (which, given how often game developers have to switch from studio can be a real problem for future employment). No sir, the games industry is not a happy place to work as a woman. 

 

So yeah, discussing sexism in the games industry media is very relevant. 

 

 

If women constitute half of all of gamers then they're clearly getting into the "boys" games, and good for them- the best fun money can buy. And why do video games need to be shackled to political correctness? Consider SC4. The player gets to play as God and has the means to murder the Sims he governs with disasters and incompetence. That's pretty twisted! But no one cares because it ain't reality

 

Video games barely influence people- parents, TV and the education system do the heavy lifting of influencing youngsters. Games like GTA V are a beautiful shining beacon of satire, fun, replayability and the ultimate comedic take on misogyny.

 

If feminists want more appropriate games, then they should put their money where their mouths are and make a new genre of games which are more 'suitable' for women and girls. One is not going to change the market by constantly protesting, the market can be changed with product and a niche to exploit. I hate how feminism has now settled its sights upon video games and the gaming industry; they've become real party-poopers you know.

 

In fact I commend companies like Rockstar for being so ballsy and not pandering to a really small fringe who have some kind of personal vendetta against video games.

[Fatherted 129]

The games industry is far less sexist than it used to be. Think Kiki Wolfkill (awesome name btw). She said any sexism in Halo 4 was to be immediately punished, which is great. (Too bad the game sucked.) The new Tomb Raider (and Rise of the Tomb Raider) are portraying a strong female character.

The editor at EG has turned the site into political correctness and 1080p comparisons. For instance, they made an article about a video which covered several important aspects of Sunset Overdrive (such as profanic garden gnomes). These weren't even mentioned in the article. The only bit that was was the part where they said you could play as a female character and all the clothing was gender neutral. They brushed over all the rest in the name of political correctness, ON A GAMING WEBSITE!

In the article the editor wrote about his sexism, he condemned how he noted that women you date in GTA IV nag at you. GTA is a satirical commentary on our society (and a fun game)? Why not stereotype a little? It's not a real-world simulator, and even if it was, it still wouldn't be politically correct.

He ended the article basically saying "if you are sexist in any way towards women, you're bad. However, don't be surprised if they do the same to you." An article telling people what to do is a bad business practice, at least.

EG has gone downhill. There are no more funny comments in the articles in case they could be construed as offensive to some people. No comments on game mechanics as they could include a politically incorrect weapon or clothing. And when a gaming website tries to be a social warrior, you know it's time to move on.

IMO, both sexes will never escape their gender. It's seen everywhere, from in school where boys ask out girls and not the other way around, where they are split routinely into two teams of opposite genders for tasks, to the workplace, where men are more likely to do physical tasks and women are more likely to do "household" style tasks, to games, where if the antagonist is gay or a non-white man it's racist or something-ist but a white male antagonist is fine.

I'd like to make a game where the antagonist is gay and the protagonist is a black woman and see the outcry as they condemn me for encouraging the murder of gay people and calling black people and women murderers.. If we reach true equality anywhere, a spot that can be filled by a white man (antagonist) should also be able to be filled by an asian lesbian woman without an eyebrow being raised. But it will be, because the media is hypocritical.

Remember that media firestorm when people thought the FC4 antagonist was gay? WHY IS THAT AN ISSUE? CAN ANTAGONISTS ONLY BE HETEROSEXUAL? ARE YOU IMPLYING THAT GAY PEOPLE LACK THE ABILITY TO BE AN EVIL TACTICAL MASTER?

I rest my (somewhat jumbled) case.

[LexusInfernus 908]

The games industry is far less sexist than it used to be. Think Kiki Wolfkill (awesome name btw). She said any sexism in Halo 4 was to be immediately punished, which is great. (Too bad the game sucked.) The new Tomb Raider (and Rise of the Tomb Raider) are portraying a strong female character.

Hardly. Just because you have now two games (both of the same franchise) where the main character isn't a white straight guy doesn't mean sexism is over. Nor does it mean that the position of women working in the games industry isn't still pretty bad. The only thing that is different is that finally, its getting more attention in the media and its slowly building pressure on companies to include more diverse characters. Just look at the flak Ubisoft got for not including a female Assassin character (and the lame excuse they gave for it). It is slowly improving, but we are far from getting there. 

 

If women constitute half of all of gamers then they're clearly getting into the "boys" games, and good for them- the best fun money can buy. And why do video games need to be shackled to political correctness? Consider SC4. The player gets to play as God and has the means to murder the Sims he governs with disasters and incompetence. That's pretty twisted! But no one cares because it ain't reality

Video games barely influence people- parents, TV and the education system do the heavy lifting of influencing youngsters. Games like GTA V are a beautiful shining beacon of satire, fun, replayability and the ultimate comedic take on misogyny.

 

If feminists want more appropriate games, then they should put their money where their mouths are and make a new genre of games which are more 'suitable' for women and girls. One is not going to change the market by constantly protesting, the market can be changed with product and a niche to exploit. I hate how feminism has now settled its sights upon video games and the gaming industry; they've become real party-poopers you know.

 

In fact I commend companies like Rockstar for being so ballsy and not pandering to a really small fringe who have some kind of personal vendetta against video games.

 

There is no such thing as 'boys' games or 'girls' games. There are good games and there are bad games. The idea that some games are for boys and some games are for girls is simply ridiculous (and again a perfect example of gender stereotyping hard at work). The Sims can be enjoyable to all people because its a good game if you are into that genre. Battlefield is a good game for everyone if you are into modern military shooters. So why can't they be a little more representative. Why is that immediately derided as 'political correctness'. What do people have against the idea of putting in the option to play as a female soldier instead of just a guy. Why are people so against more games that include interesting female lead characters in adventure games. 

 

And see, feminists do not want to make games that are more appropriate for women or girls because why should they. The existing genres are just fine. All they want (and all I want) are more diverse character casts. I'm getting sick and tired of that gruffy white dude that you play in almost every game. I want kickass women in that mix as well. I want balance in the number of games including women and number of games including guys.

 

And as much as I enjoyed GTA V, it does portray women rather unfairly. In the whole game there is literally one women who is shown as competent, and she is a side character who is only available for like two heists. All the other women are portrayed as insane, lazy, unreasonable, vain, slutty idiots, where most guys are simply portrayed as selfish *ssh**es but who are at least competent at the things they do. Why? In a game like GTA V, why can't there be a few more women that are portrayed as at least competent people. Why couldn't one of the three characters be female. How would that have been 'pandering to a really small fringe who have some kind of personal vendetta against video games' and not making an interesting game with an interesting and diverse cast. How would it have made the game worse or politically correct? I'm not asking Rockstar to stop making the games that they make, I don't ask them to stop including their particular brand of humor, I'm simply asking them to include a few more likeable characters of the opposite sex, you know, that other half of humanity. It shouldn't hurt their game in any way by including more than one competent female character. 

[Fatherted 129]

Ubisoft is using real actors for motion capture and voice acting. As such, it would cost hundreds of thousands to add a legitimate female character (not a guy model with boobs) and for what? The story and scripting would cost hundreds of thousands more to add in an arbitrary tick box. When a game revolves around a specific gender, you can't just throw in the other. Case in point: Tomb Raider and AC Liberation. Male characters would be rubbish for those stories.

Also, Battlefield is the only major FPS not to include female soldiers (which is a bit weird TBH but you also cannot customise your player at all). Halo, CoD, Titanfall, CounterStrike all have female options, it's just up to DICE whether they want to rehash animations or not.

If you want a character of either gender they need to be conceived from the start (Sunset Overdrive has voice actors and slightly different scripts for female characters which is how it should be done, not a girl chucked in a guy's story). I expect the next AC will take a strong female lead to compensate for the overblown media storm.

[mrsmartman 200]

 

The games industry is far less sexist than it used to be. Think Kiki Wolfkill (awesome name btw). She said any sexism in Halo 4 was to be immediately punished, which is great. (Too bad the game sucked.) The new Tomb Raider (and Rise of the Tomb Raider) are portraying a strong female character.

Hardly. Just because you have now two games (both of the same franchise) where the main character isn't a white straight guy doesn't mean sexism is over. Nor does it mean that the position of women working in the games industry isn't still pretty bad. The only thing that is different is that finally, its getting more attention in the media and its slowly building pressure on companies to include more diverse characters. Just look at the flak Ubisoft got for not including a female Assassin character (and the lame excuse they gave for it). It is slowly improving, but we are far from getting there. 

 

If women constitute half of all of gamers then they're clearly getting into the "boys" games, and good for them- the best fun money can buy. And why do video games need to be shackled to political correctness? Consider SC4. The player gets to play as God and has the means to murder the Sims he governs with disasters and incompetence. That's pretty twisted! But no one cares because it ain't reality

Video games barely influence people- parents, TV and the education system do the heavy lifting of influencing youngsters. Games like GTA V are a beautiful shining beacon of satire, fun, replayability and the ultimate comedic take on misogyny.

 

If feminists want more appropriate games, then they should put their money where their mouths are and make a new genre of games which are more 'suitable' for women and girls. One is not going to change the market by constantly protesting, the market can be changed with product and a niche to exploit. I hate how feminism has now settled its sights upon video games and the gaming industry; they've become real party-poopers you know.

 

In fact I commend companies like Rockstar for being so ballsy and not pandering to a really small fringe who have some kind of personal vendetta against video games.

 

There is no such thing as 'boys' games or 'girls' games. There are good games and there are bad games. The idea that some games are for boys and some games are for girls is simply ridiculous (and again a perfect example of gender stereotyping hard at work). The Sims can be enjoyable to all people because its a good game if you are into that genre. Battlefield is a good game for everyone if you are into modern military shooters. So why can't they be a little more representative. Why is that immediately derided as 'political correctness'. What do people have against the idea of putting in the option to play as a female soldier instead of just a guy. Why are people so against more games that include interesting female lead characters in adventure games. 

 

And see, feminists do not want to make games that are more appropriate for women or girls because why should they. The existing genres are just fine. All they want (and all I want) are more diverse character casts. I'm getting sick and tired of that gruffy white dude that you play in almost every game. I want kickass women in that mix as well. I want balance in the number of games including women and number of games including guys.

 

And as much as I enjoyed GTA V, it does portray women rather unfairly. In the whole game there is literally one women who is shown as competent, and she is a side character who is only available for like two heists. All the other women are portrayed as insane, lazy, unreasonable, vain, slutty idiots, where most guys are simply portrayed as selfish *ssh**es but who are at least competent at the things they do. Why? In a game like GTA V, why can't there be a few more women that are portrayed as at least competent people. Why couldn't one of the three characters be female. How would that have been 'pandering to a really small fringe who have some kind of personal vendetta against video games' and not making an interesting game with an interesting and diverse cast. How would it have made the game worse or politically correct? I'm not asking Rockstar to stop making the games that they make, I don't ask them to stop including their particular brand of humor, I'm simply asking them to include a few more likeable characters of the opposite sex, you know, that other half of humanity. It shouldn't hurt their game in any way by including more than one competent female character. 

 

This has become a CSR issue. If there is no significant pressure from activists and game players, the studio would not have much incentive to change the game.

 

BTW, the reason why EA does not offer big maps for SimCity 2013, as I believe, is that the project won't generate much cash flow.

[LexusInfernus 908]

Ubisoft is using real actors for motion capture and voice acting. As such, it would cost hundreds of thousands to add a legitimate female character (not a guy model with boobs) and for what? The story and scripting would cost hundreds of thousands more to add in an arbitrary tick box. When a game revolves around a specific gender, you can't just throw in the other. Case in point: Tomb Raider and AC Liberation. Male characters would be rubbish for those stories.

Also, Battlefield is the only major FPS not to include female soldiers (which is a bit weird TBH but you also cannot customise your player at all). Halo, CoD, Titanfall, CounterStrike all have female options, it's just up to DICE whether they want to rehash animations or not.

If you want a character of either gender they need to be conceived from the start (Sunset Overdrive has voice actors and slightly different scripts for female characters which is how it should be done, not a girl chucked in a guy's story). I expect the next AC will take a strong female lead to compensate for the overblown media storm.

Well why is AC a guys only story? Weren't there any females around during the French revolution? Give me one good reason as to why there can't be more Assassins Creed games that include females. And why not add just a guy model with boobs? Women are humans, they do not fundamentally move in such a different way that it can't be done by guys, and if they move as guys in an action game, no one would care. Whats important is that there is a female character, not a female model. And games like Assassins Creed do not fundamentally revolve around a specific gender. You could throw in a female character in Assassins Creed unity and it would work fine. It requires a bit more effort from the writing team to write in a female character, but you don't have to change the setting or the story. 

 

Look, believe it or not, but women have always represented about half of the human race. They were there and they have always been there throughout history, present at nearly all big historical events, it shouldn't be hard for writers to include women into these games. 

 

And as good as Tomb Raider and AC liberation were for including well written female characters, lets not pretend that those were 'girl stories'. AC Liberation wasn't all that different from the other AC games with male leads, apart from a few mechanics (that would have worked on guys just as well). And Tomb Raider is done by males all the time. Just look at Uncharted. Or any other action adventure platforming game ever. All that differs Tomb Raider from all the other games in its genre is that the writers wrote a good female character as the lead, but the overall setting and story was gender neutral and could have just as easily been a game with a male character in the lead. My point is, AC Liberation and Tomb Raider aren't fundamentally 'different' games with fundamentally 'different' stories just to make the female character fit. 

 

And again, there are no 'guy stories' unless the story is specifically about the experience of being a guy which is fundamentally different from being a girl. But we havent seen a game about that yet. Most games these days have stories that are essentially gender neutral, every gender can participate in them. 

[BLANKBLANK 4,414]

And as much as I enjoyed GTA V, it does portray women rather unfairly. In the whole game there is literally one women who is shown as competent, and she is a side character who is only available for like two heists. All the other women are portrayed as insane, lazy, unreasonable, vain, slutty idiots, where most guys are simply portrayed as selfish *ssh**es but who are at least competent at the things they do. Why? In a game like GTA V, why can't there be a few more women that are portrayed as at least competent people. Why couldn't one of the three characters be female. How would that have been 'pandering to a really small fringe who have some kind of personal vendetta against video games' and not making an interesting game with an interesting and diverse cast. How would it have made the game worse or politically correct? I'm not asking Rockstar to stop making the games that they make, I don't ask them to stop including their particular brand of humor, I'm simply asking them to include a few more likeable characters of the opposite sex, you know, that other half of humanity. It shouldn't hurt their game in any way by including more than one competent female character. 

 

 

Stereotypes. I've never heard of a black female gangster, or a female mafia boss. I thought the range of female characters in GTA V was pretty much reflective of the US criminal underworld today. Prostitutes, trophy wifes, hot girlfriends, baby mommas... These are women using what they got to get a slice of the money the male criminals are making, but with far less risk. I think it is a competent strategy to get somewhere in life or to at least make a living.

[LexusInfernus 908]

Stereotypes. I've never heard of a black female gangster, or a female mafia boss. I thought the range of female characters in GTA V was pretty much reflective of the US criminal underworld today. Prostitutes, trophy wifes, hot girlfriends, baby mommas... These are women using what they got to get a slice of the money the male criminals are making, but with far less risk. I think it is a competent strategy to get somewhere in life or to at least make a living.

And just how familiar are you with the US criminal underworld anyways? Look, just because you haven't heard of them doesn't mean they don't exist. Female gansters, bankrobbers, gang leaders, they exist and they are not nearly as uncommon as people think. Besides, GTA is a piece of fiction, so would it have been so bad if they took a little artistic freedom and wrote and included one playable female gangster as one of the protagonists? I mean, they had no problem doing that with Trevor, going for a full blown psychopath nutcase. So would it have hurt them so much if one of them was female? I think it could have worked out brilliantly, and it certainly would have opened up the possibility for new paths within the story and for new ways to make jokes. 

[BLANKBLANK 4,414]

 

And just how familiar are you with the US criminal underworld anyways? Look, just because you haven't heard of them doesn't mean they don't exist. Female gansters, bankrobbers, gang leaders, they exist and they are not nearly as uncommon as people think. Besides, GTA is a piece of fiction, so would it have been so bad if they took a little artistic freedom and wrote and included one playable female gangster as one of the protagonists? I mean, they had no problem doing that with Trevor, going for a full blown psychopath nutcase. So would it have hurt them so much if one of them was female? I think it could have worked out brilliantly, and it certainly would have opened up the possibility for new paths within the story and for new ways to make jokes. 

 

 

I think Rockstar would have been crucified if Trevor had been a female 'full blown psychopath nutcase'. I'm thinking allegations of false portrayal of women would crop up.

[mrsmartman 200]

Gender has become a highly sensitive issue.

[LexusInfernus 908]

I think Rockstar would have been crucified if Trevor had been a female 'full blown psychopath nutcase'. I'm thinking allegations of false portrayal of women would crop up.

 

I don't think so, because Trevor is a well developed character. You can get away with writing a full blown psychopath as long as you write someone like that in a good and believable manner. 

 

But even then, they didn't have to write Trevor as a women. They could have made Michael or Franklin a female character as well. 

[Motina 77]

First, feminists do not turn rape victims into sad pitiful victims who are totally defined by what happened to them. You are putting words into a whole movements mouth, don't do that. Second, rape culture is not perpetuated by 'self pitying' of victims. Do you even know what rape culture means?  Third, yes there is a rape culture. The proof is everywhere, from the extremely low conviction rate, to the systemic victim blaming, to the trivializing of rape as 'just another assault crime'. Which is why your idea that you can kill rape culture by stop making it special both flawed and correct at the same time. Its correct that rape culture would disappear if it gets treated like any other crime. Its flawed because you assume that already happens everywhere outside feminist circles, which again, is clearly not the case if we look at the evidence. Again, rape gets trivialized by people, the victim and not the attacker gets the brunt of the blame for the crime, the police in far to many cases doesn't bother to go after rapists (evidenced by the huge rape kit backlog in a bunch of major cities) and when they do get taken to court, the conviction rate is ridiculously low. 

 

If feminists talk about rape culture, they talk about how rape culture prevents rape from being treated like other severe crimes and what they want in the end is that rape gets treated like those other crimes by society and the justice system.

 

If you mean among violent crimes, yeah, it is low, but certainly not extremely low or even outside the range of violent crimes. The only good conviction rate for a violent crime, at least in the U.S. is murder. All other violent crimes are under 50% The conviction rate for rape in Washington state is 24%, this is not far off from robbery at 30%. For Washington state, for non-violent crimes, the conviction rate is abysmal, as low as the imaginary 6% number for rape convictions. In the UK, for rape, the conviction rate is 37% to 60%. Of course this does not mean much. We can speculate all we want. But low conviction rates (or high acquittals) can swing both ways, from people being charged for crimes they never committed or not being punished for crimes they did commit.

 

Since I am Canadian, for people found guilty, here is Statistics Canada for 2011/2012:

Homicide - 50%

Attempted Murder - 26%

Robbery - 63%

Sexual Assault - 41%

Other sexual Offenses (against children) - 69%

Major Assaults - 53%

Common Assaults - 48%

Uttering threats - 51%

Criminal harassment - 50%

Other violent offenses - 41%

 

For Canada, the conviction rate for attempted murdered is very low, and sexual offenses against children is somewhat high. Is sexual assault on the low end, yeah, but not extremely low. We cannot bash the legal system for those who not pursue legal actions, or those who do not report the crime.

 

Now how about Statistics Canada report crimes for 2011, compared to court cases

In 2011, the number of reports for violent crime was 424,410. The number of court case for violent crime, for 2011 was 91,697.

21% of reports go to court

Sexual Assault:

22,376 reported crimes - 3,949 court cases

17% of reports go to court

Sexual offense towards children:

3,822 reported crimes - 2,286 court cases

60% of reports go to court

Violent assaults:

251,939 reported crimes - 57,670 court cases

23% of cases go to court:

Robbery:

29, 746 reported crimes - 3,804 court cases

13% of cases go to court

 

How are the rates "extremely" different?

 

The previous Statscan report I posted earlier in this thread stated for violent crimes, the rate of unreported violent crimes for men and women is 61% and 74% respectively. Not sure what the rate for reporting is for children. I think we can safely (sadly - it is all quite sad, but this is a tragic reality) assume it is much higher percentage than than 60-75%.

[BLANKBLANK 4,414]

Here's an article where I just facepalmed-

 

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/jul/04/labour-womens-safety-yvette-cooper-fgm-revenge-porn

 

-and the reason I did so is the bigotry implied. Women's safety commissioner... How about people's safety commissioner!?! Men can be domestically abused to in the UK, and there are more cases of assault (and murder) on men than on women. But that's not important as clearly women have it much worse.

 

I grow tired of this one-sided focus, and the media is so rife with these kind of articles. Crime on men; statistics. Crime on women; deeply personal and sensationalized. It's the result of modern-day feminism; it's evolving into a new form of bigotry. And it is indeed bigotry since so many people, women and men, read this MSM garbage and don't bat an eyelid.

 

It's an attitude which reminds me of the bigotry in the US when there was racial segregation. The worse part was not the discrimination, but white Americans (who lived in states were racial segregation still remained) who accepted it as normal and were content in their belief that a negro was less than a white.

 

History rhymes and sexual discrimination has now evolved, it used to be men were better than women (a woman's place is at the home and all of that BS), now the tables have turned; violence against men is downplayed whilst violence against women is sensationalized. Circumcision (male genital mutilation)? Not a iota of concern. Female genital mutilation? Uproar when it happens.

 

A new kind of bigotry is at work here. Most don't even realise it or don't give it a second thought. Feminists though live and breathe it. The loathing of men is there, the sensationalism is there, the dehumanization is there and the fear is there to. Just like it was with all the white folk who were bigoted against the blacks. Those whites hated the black, they dehumanized black people, and more importantly the whites were afraid of black people being emancipated; they really thought it would be the end of the world and against the natural order of things. They lived and breathed such discrimination and never questioned it.

 

Enough of this bigotry. No more feminism, no more MRAs. Egalitarianism plus the understanding that both sexes are different, so while both have the same opportunities and rights; the outcomes will be different.

[LexusInfernus 908]

Here's an article where I just facepalmed-

 

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/jul/04/labour-womens-safety-yvette-cooper-fgm-revenge-porn

 

-and the reason I did so is the bigotry implied. Women's safety commissioner... How about people's safety commissioner!?! Men can be domestically abused to in the UK, and there are more cases of assault (and murder) on men than on women. But that's not important as clearly women have it much worse.

The peoples safety commissioner is already a thing, its called the police commissioner, so stop whining that men get totally ignored and their position is getting undermined, because thats just not the case. This commissioner is there to specifically deal with issues that disproportionately affects women, such as forced marriages and revenge porn. The idea that with this commissioner suddenly crime against guys gets ignored is just a blatant misrepresentation of the truth, in essence nothing changes for males while women get a tiny bit of extra attention. 

 

I grow tired of this one-sided focus, and the media is so rife with these kind of articles. Crime on men; statistics. Crime on women; deeply personal and sensationalized. It's the result of modern-day feminism; it's evolving into a new form of bigotry. And it is indeed bigotry since so many people, women and men, read this MSM garbage and don't bat an eyelid.

 

It's an attitude which reminds me of the bigotry in the US when there was racial segregation. The worse part was not the discrimination, but white Americans (who lived in states were racial segregation still remained) who accepted it as normal and were content in their belief that a negro was less than a white.

 

Wow, you just compared the systemic oppression of black people in the US to how guys are treated in todays society, because women get a special person who is going to look into crimes that disproportionately affects women? You think thats bigotry? Wow.... 

 

History rhymes and sexual discrimination has now evolved, it used to be men were better than women (a woman's place is at the home and all of that BS), now the tables have turned; violence against men is downplayed whilst violence against women is sensationalized. Circumcision (male genital mutilation)? Not a iota of concern. Female genital mutilation? Uproar when it happens.

 

Well for one, there are groups that argue that circumcision of boys should stop because it is genital mutilation. The reason it doesn't get that much attention is because its a tradition that is pretty common in Europe and because the health effects are noticeably less severe. But okay, in essence it comes down to the same thing, which is why in Germany for example, its already banned. 

 

And, if you actually knew what feminism stands for, you would know that feminists do not downplay violence against men. Stop blaming feminism of things that have nothing to do with feminism. Educate yourself on what feminism is, what it does and what it stands for, rather than go on the image the MRA's have created for feminism. 

 

A new kind of bigotry is at work here. Most don't even realise it or don't give it a second thought. Feminists though live and breathe it. The loathing of men is there, the sensationalism is there, the dehumanization is there and the fear is there to. Just like it was with all the white folk who were bigoted against the blacks. Those whites hated the black, they dehumanized black people, and more importantly the whites were afraid of black people being emancipated; they really thought it would be the end of the world and against the natural order of things. They lived and breathed such discrimination and never questioned it.

 

Enough of this bigotry. No more feminism, no more MRAs. Egalitarianism plus the understanding that both sexes are different, so while both have the same opportunities and rights; the outcomes will be different.

 

Oh the irony. 

 

Look, I don't know how to say this without discussing you as the person, so I'm gonna leave it at this. I just hope that everyone else who reads this also realizes the irony of your post. 

[Fatherted 129]

What I hate most is people who claim to be feminists by clinging to the most basic and flawed ideals, like Mr Tom Bradwell of Eurogamer. He thinks he's a freedom fighter and looks good because he shoehorns sexism into unrelated discussions for his own agenda. Long story short is he is using feminism to get laid, ironically.

Take, for example, this recent article. http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2014-07-05-its-not-historically-accurate

Very interesting premise. Should willing suspension of disbelief be a thing for games? How far should we go? What is allowed to be changed and what must be accurate?

Nope. The first paragraph is an attack on his readers telling them they are sexist. The only part that has anything to do with games is the "should hay save your life part", and that has nothing to do with historical accuracy. The rest is shoehorned attacks on sexism (not suggested by the topic), with no insights on the actual subject of the article past "women are great why am I the only one that can see that". Using his holier-than-thou attacks on people who read his website for his personal gain and then paying himself a pretty substantial salary to do so is why nobody takes Eurogamer seriously anymore.

I'm bored of people who care about women's rights because it is fashionable to. They aren't feminists, they cling onto old and tired defences and go on the attack at every turn. They turn every discussion on anything into a comment on sexism for their personal gain. A feminist, at least, would probably not write the article title as if it would have had substance.

[LexusInfernus 908]

What I hate most is people who claim to be feminists by clinging to the most basic and flawed ideals, like Mr Tom Bradwell of Eurogamer. He thinks he's a freedom fighter and looks good because he shoehorns sexism into unrelated discussions for his own agenda. Long story short is he is using feminism to get laid, ironically.

Take, for example, this recent article. http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2014-07-05-its-not-historically-accurate

Very interesting premise. Should willing suspension of disbelief be a thing for games? How far should we go? What is allowed to be changed and what must be accurate?

Nope. The first paragraph is an attack on his readers telling them they are sexist. The only part that has anything to do with games is the "should hay save your life part", and that has nothing to do with historical accuracy. The rest is shoehorned attacks on sexism (not suggested by the topic), with no insights on the actual subject of the article past "women are great why am I the only one that can see that". Using his holier-than-thou attacks on people who read his website for his personal gain and then paying himself a pretty substantial salary to do so is why nobody takes Eurogamer seriously anymore.

Are you sure you linked to the right article? His first paragraph does not attack its readers or calls them sexist. All he says is that he is a sexist and that he is trying to change, and that a few readers got mad over that realization of himself. Then he goes on to say that he also got a lot of supportive and thought provoking comments from other readers. If anything, he is more busy praising his readers. 

 

And then he goes on to dismantle the 'women aren't in games cuz its not historically accurate' argument by pointing out two major counter arguments. One is that games are not realistically accurate anyways, so 'realism' doesn't fit as an argument when your character can jump from great heights and not break a bone because he lands in a cart of hay. 

 

The second are larger argument is that history itself is sexist and biased against women, and he gives a few very nice examples of that. He counters the assumption that women played no role in history by pointing out either historical evidence that this is nonsense, or major flaws in the assumptions historians made about the role of women in history. How is this a bad article? I think its pretty interesting and thought provoking. How is he attacking his readers?

 

Honestly, if you think this article was about suspension of disbelief in games, I think you didn't get what the article was about in the first place. And should you be mad that the article wasn't about what you thought it was about? I think thats your own fault, given that the sub title is "Why arguing against women appearing in games to preserve historical accuracy is silly."

 

I'm bored of people who care about women's rights because it is fashionable to. They aren't feminists, they cling onto old and tired defences and go on the attack at every turn. They turn every discussion on anything into a comment on sexism for their personal gain. A feminist, at least, would probably not write the article title as if it would have had substance.

 

How do you know when someone is sincere and when someone only does it because its fashionable? And why wouldn't a feminist write the article? Why can't a feminist point out that our assumptions about the historical role of women is probably wrong? And why is it so hard to accept that people genuinely believe in the feminist cause? 

[NMUSpidey 3,956]

Seemed like a reasonably well-written article with a reasonable premise to me.  As I see it, so far as the portrayal of females in games, console games are largely marketed towards male gamers anyways, and XBoxs and Playstations to the more "hardcore" variety, and they're the ones giving the makers of games like Assassin's Creed money.  Why bother changing their course?  Those guys sure aren't pressuring for it.

 

Anyways, I do think his overall point is fairly good and after reading it, I did not feel offended or emasculated in any way.  Honestly, though, I don't enjoy games like Halo or Assassin's Creed or Battlefield Honor Merit Badge or whatever their grayscale army shooters are called, so whatever's happening in those games with those characters, I could not care any less than I already don't.  Realistically, we won't see any change in those monstrosities until their studios all crash, but if there are enough women who are upset about it, they should learn programming and make some kick-ass indy games.  That's a thing right now, right?  Isn't the indy games market like a big thing right now?  I'd recommend that, and then when the big studios go belly-up you can jump after pieces of their market!

 

So far as historical accuracy, they use it here to rigidly define genders roles at home.  Japanese women, when they get married, are expected to quit their jobs to run the home.  In fact, the government of Tokyo recently got itself in trouble when some male members of the assembly shouted at a female member giving a speech or something that she should just get married already.  I assume she was saying something they disagreed with that had merit, and some guy came forward as a scapegoat and took one for his (horrifyingly rotten and corrupt) team.  Anyways, then Japanese women are supposed to make babies.  There has been little deviancy from this model based upon 'traditional gender roles.'  HOWEVER, in pre-Meiji Japan, families all worked together.  Men and women did housework, toiled in the rice paddies, made crap to sell, and sold crap.  When you're living a Gilligan's Island lifestyle, everyone pitches in or you stand a pretty good chance of dying, so guys were cooking and cleaning and women were planting rice and doing other manly crap or whatever ([sarcasm]except women generally breastfed, damn the patriarchy for forcing them to![/sarcasm]).  Yeah, men were emperors, Shoguns, and samurai and generally did all the politically important stuff, but aristocratic women were held to samurai ideals as well, they just never really fought and died on the battlefields before Edo Period.  So yeah, 'historical accuracy' or 'tradition' generally does not hold up as well when you look closer at it.

[LexusInfernus 908]

Seemed like a reasonably well-written article with a reasonable premise to me.  As I see it, so far as the portrayal of females in games, console games are largely marketed towards male gamers anyways, and XBoxs and Playstations to the more "hardcore" variety, and they're the ones giving the makers of games like Assassin's Creed money.  Why bother changing their course?  Those guys sure aren't pressuring for it.

 

Anyways, I do think his overall point is fairly good and after reading it, I did not feel offended or emasculated in any way.  Honestly, though, I don't enjoy games like Halo or Assassin's Creed or Battlefield Honor Merit Badge or whatever their grayscale army shooters are called, so whatever's happening in those games with those characters, I could not care any less than I already don't.  Realistically, we won't see any change in those monstrosities until their studios all crash, but if there are enough women who are upset about it, they should learn programming and make some kick-ass indy games.  That's a thing right now, right?  Isn't the indy games market like a big thing right now?  I'd recommend that, and then when the big studios go belly-up you can jump after pieces of their market!

Well, thats the thing. These games are marketed towards males, but half of the market that plays them are females. Why should they consistently be left out? Furthermore, why stiffle your own creativity by constantly using the same dude bro characters. Whats wrong with adding a little diversity in protagonists. Its only expanding your own creativity and your creative options. Finally, we should wonder why these so called 'gamers' that yell the loudest every time when this topic comes up are so threatened by the idea that oh my god the protagonist is a female! 

 

And why should indie games pave the way? Assassins Creed already had a pretty cool female protagonist once, Mass Effect's FemShep was great, Bioshock's infinite had definitely one of the most awesome female protagonists ever. And those are all games that were received very positively. It shows that female characters in games work just fine and it shows that the group of 'gamers' that start crying every time at the idea that females are also human beings and should be included are actually an insignificant but very loud minority. This message needs to be hammered into the thick brains of the publishers so they stop preventing their studios from also including more female characters. 

[NMUSpidey 3,956]

Well, thats the thing. These games are marketed towards males, but half of the market that plays them are females. Why should they consistently be left out? Furthermore, why stiffle your own creativity by constantly using the same dude bro characters. Whats wrong with adding a little diversity in protagonists. Its only expanding your own creativity and your creative options. Finally, we should wonder why these so called 'gamers' that yell the loudest every time when this topic comes up are so threatened by the idea that oh my god the protagonist is a female! 

 

And why should indie games pave the way? Assassins Creed already had a pretty cool female protagonist once, Mass Effect's FemShep was great, Bioshock's infinite had definitely one of the most awesome female protagonists ever. And those are all games that were received very positively. It shows that female characters in games work just fine and it shows that the group of 'gamers' that start crying every time at the idea that females are also human beings and should be included are actually an insignificant but very loud minority. This message needs to be hammered into the thick brains of the publishers so they stop preventing their studios from also including more female characters. 

 

sigh  I guess I should have spelled it out that I pretty much agree with you.  I should have been more obvious than sarcastic with my opening paragraph.

 

The reason I thought about indy games- wait, indie games?  Is it 'indy' or 'indie'?  I can't remember.  Anyways, ind*coughcough* games paving the way was because I've seen articles floating around whining about the sexism involved with working for a big computer company among other things.  I thought that by creating ind*coughcough* games that sexism could be sidestepped and women would have a place to create whatever they want.  The entrenched are making money doing what they're doing.  Until they stop making money doing this, I do not think it is reasonable at all to expect them to change just because some people wrote a few articles complaining about it.  So fight them by taking their money away, not by appealing to their consciouses or lawyering up.  Ind*coughcough* games.

 

I'll say again, I agree with what you're saying.  I think it's bad to discriminate against your female employees like that, and I think it's good to have strong female characters in your games (or movies or books or TV shows, and I try to do that in my own writing in my city journals), but I also don't like violent video games at all (outside of Civilization), so most of this does not really apply to me, because I'm not buying that crap in the first place.

[Fatherted 129]

My issue with the article was the editor seems fixated on being a hero and not a journalist. It looked like it was going to tackle a serious question (for instance, the historical inaccuracy of Ryse or Watch Dogs for gameplay and story purposes) but instead devolved the whole argument into "Why dont u have wimin in ur gemes they r gr8 why can only I c that". Something akin to 40% of games offer a female character option or it is mandatory to play as a female and lo and behold, it was found in 2013 that 40% of the gaming population is female. Hmm, sounds fair to me. The more dollars you give the more representation you get. I don't see many disabled characters, or characters with terminal diseases, but those demographics play games as much as any other.

The article was clickbait. Get 100,000 views because the title looked interesting and pat yourself on the back. If they left because it was whiny as were other editorial pieces beforehand, then so what? You got your ad dollars for a boring ass article.

I could easily start advocating in the guest articles I write on websites, everywhere, for the rights of black people in everything to be represented everywhere. I could devolve everything into a racial issue.

"Forza Horizon 2: The Man Behind The Wheel"

Sounds interesting, right? Great clickbait.

"As I delved into the menus, the first thing I noticed was the lack of an option to change your driver or customise him. Of course, he is a white male due to the rampant stereotyping of the games industry."

Not so interesting, right?

"As soon as I jumped into the car, I noticed that only around 35% of the population at the festival was black. This is obvious misrepresentation in games. Are they suggesting black people are in general too poor to attend a high end festival like this?"

Getting duller...

"I was challenged to a race by a man named Joey Pornello. He was black, I though to myself. I know that many gamers would instantly quit the second they saw a black man challenging them to a race."

Snore.

This is exactly how Tom Bramwell writes. Replace black (man) with woman and you get an almost identical writing style.

If he mentioned it and gave it as much weight as everything else in the article, it would be no big deal. But it gets the spotlight. Every. Single. Time.

That's why nobody takes the editorials seriously anymore.

[danathomas 7]

I am always shocked at the amount of men that have deeply rooted issues with women. Heres a simple rule: if you wouldnt want to be treated that way, do not treat a women that way. This world is a far ways away from being truley equal for the sexes. Even in america men have major problems with women excersizing their oppurtunities. There is a glass ceiling, there is a wage gap. These are true statements and should be addressed without all of the hate speech from men that cant get laid.

[LexusInfernus 908]

My issue with the article was the editor seems fixated on being a hero and not a journalist. It looked like it was going to tackle a serious question (for instance, the historical inaccuracy of Ryse or Watch Dogs for gameplay and story purposes) but instead devolved the whole argument into "Why dont u have wimin in ur gemes they r gr8 why can only I c that". Something akin to 40% of games offer a female character option or it is mandatory to play as a female and lo and behold, it was found in 2013 that 40% of the gaming population is female. Hmm, sounds fair to me. The more dollars you give the more representation you get. I don't see many disabled characters, or characters with terminal diseases, but those demographics play games as much as any other.

Dude, the article wasn't about "Why don't you have more women in your game", it was about discussing a popular argument a lot of people use to justify the lack of women in games. And he showed that this argument is just nonsensical for several reasons. 

 

And if you think his articles are boring, well fine, thats a valid argument. But don't go around blaming feminists that you think some people write boring articles because they write about things you don't care about. Those people are free to write about whatever they think is relevant. They are under no obligation to only write articles that cater to your specific interests. 

 

[Motina 77]

This world is a far ways away from being truley equal for the sexes. There is a glass ceiling, there is a wage gap. These are true statements and should be addressed...

 

I am going to ignore all the venomous diatribe, because it is ironic, and focus on what you state as "true". The wage gap is an aggregate number of all jobs. The only way to solve that problem is to deal with the children. 12% stay at home fathers. This could be greater? Yes, but hopefully not because of the economic reality called the "he-cession". Unmarried women, with no kids make more then men, and this has been true since the seventies. The economist Thomas Sewel in the 70s said the real difference is between mothers (the glass ceiling) and everyone else. One quarter of the wage gap is simply from full time working men working more than full time working women, or working later in life. Current stats have unmarried women in certain cities like Atlanta making 20% more than males. Again this is just breaking up the aggregate numbers.