Destructoid article: iOS game lets you beat your boyfriend [...]

This probably shouldn't be on the apple store, its pretty gross : (

Is the iOS certification process just hat full of papers with bad game ideas scrawled down on them?

@Gamer_152 said:

The whole "The games industry says it's only sexist if it's a woman" idea that's being expressed in here is a total strawman, when has anything like that been implied? The difference is, while this app is pretty gross and arguably worthy of at least some attention, it doesn't have anything to do with the upper echelons of the games industry, while much of the questionable content involving women in games does, and it's not representative of an overall much larger issue, while a lot of stuff involving women in the industry has been. I don't think an app like this really merits a Patrick article, as it's not really part of a big issue or trend in the industry, it's just this weird, anomalous, all be it distasteful thing.

Shut this thread down, we're done here.

Meh, can't say I'm mad, maybe Patrick can write an article about it and see what male members of the gaming industry think about it.

@SlashDance said:

It's different when it's a woman. Duh.

@Sooty said:

Sorry it's only sexist if it's a woman. - gaming industry logic

How to build a better strawman.

@Phuturist: What you're talking about in that specific situation for the first point, that's separate from the overall ways we discuss the games and game culture. I must admit I don't quite understand what you mean with the second point. As for the third point, I think you're using circular logic; You can't claim "Most games are targeted purely at men and exclude women, so it's okay that most games are targeted at men and exclude women". If all movies were action movies you'd have more of a point, but they're not, and I think that in itself says something about the games industry. When by your own admission traditional games are such a male-dominated space when compared to movies, I don't see how you can argue that games are more progressive. Even if you could, I don't think the "Movies do it too" or "Movies did it first" line of reasoning is grounds to suggest that what games are doing is any less wrong.

I strongly disagree with the idea that modern society is harder on men than women, although I think there are problems on both sides, and I think you should care about what happened before your lifetime because it's essential to a proper understanding of the state of equality, gender issues, and similar concepts today. Whether you want to acknowledge it or not, the baggage that comes with sexism against women is there, and the individual controversies pointed out in games are usually pointed out within the context of much larger issues within the industry.

@rebgav: I think it would be a fallacy to say that all digitally distributed titles get the same level of exposure, and I think we have to remember that exposure of the app is a separate issue from how prominent the people making it are in the industry, or how representative it is of the market its occupying. I think the difference in responsibility between this company and someone like Square Enix is based in how much influence each of them has in the industry, the size of their audience, and to what degree they've become well-known or representative of the industry. I think you'd struggle to seriously say that the people who made this game are influential in games, have a huge audience, and are well-known representatives of the games industry. Nobody is giving them a pass though; as I said before, I don't think this game is okay, and I think we almost all agree that making light of domestic abuse in a game is reprehensible.

@Make_Me_Mad: And it is different when that kind of thing is both symptomatic of and representative of a larger issue in games and the gaming industry, and has its roots in a greater cultural controversy. I have to agree with Justin McElroy on that one "For those of you saying it would be the same if they did it with a male, ask yourself, why didn't they?".

I am trying to keep it short, so am not commenting on every point, hope that's alright for you.

@Gamer_152 said:

As for the third point, I think you're using circular logic; You can't claim "Most games are targeted purely at men and exclude women, so it's okay that most games are targeted at men and exclude women". If all movies were action movies you'd have more of a point, but they're not, and I think that in itself says something about the games industry. When by your own admission traditional games are such a male-dominated space when compared to movies, I don't see how you can argue that games are more progressive. Even if you could, I don't think the "Movies do it too" or "Movies did it first" line of reasoning is grounds to suggest that what games are doing is any less wrong.

I did not say that. What I meant is the following: Look at movies catered towards men, look at movies catered towards women. I think we can both agree with the observation, that movies for men have a lot of action and violence, in example running, fighting, climbing, shooting, while movies catered towards women consist of mainly dialogues and romance.

My point is, look at your controller/gamepad/mouse+keyboard. What's easy to do, huh? Running? 100% control possible. Fighting? 100% control possible within set movement sets. Climbing? 100% control possible. Shooting? 100% control possible.

Dialogue? Very limited control, interaction only possible with huge amounts of work.

Romance? Very limited control, interaction only possible with huge amounts of work.

So cleary, due to the nature of our beloved interactive medium, we are always going to have a lot of action, and not a whole lot of interactive dialogue. Attempts at dialogue interaction are always more of a decision making point, where you press one key for decision a, and the other one for decision b. True human interaction and emotion, the focus of media catered towards women, is extremely hard to achieve by gameplay means.

That is why video games are mostly catered for men. Stories of success from games focusing on human interaction, like The Walking Dead, are a new trend, and a trend that might change all of that, but video games never going to be as equally consumed among the genders as movies are.

I hope you understand what I meant now.

But that hardly is the point of our topic now is it?

@Gamer_152 said:

I strongly disagree with the idea that modern society is harder on men than women, although I think there are problems on both sides, and I think you should care about what happened before your lifetime because it's essential to a proper understanding of the state of equality, gender issues, and similar concepts today. Whether you want to acknowledge it or not, the baggage that comes with sexism against women is there, and the individual controversies pointed out in games are usually pointed out within the context of much larger issues within the industry.

I am sorry, maybe I understood it wrong, but what I gather from this was "Society is not harder on men than on women because it was harder on women a while ago". Is that what you wanted to say? So, philosophically, if society would live by this reasoning, you must see how there would never be a point when it is accepted to say "now, society is harder on men than on women", because the counterargument "it wasn't like this before" is always valid, no matter the state of our present.

And I feel we passed that point.

My problem with people like you, if you would please excuse this expression, that it is not acceptable to question your assumption, that women are being discriminated. Many here call out "mysoginist!" at that point. If women are not equal now and still being discriminated, will all of the feminists stop saying they are not, as soon as they are equal? What would it take for that? Statistics? We already have those, but people bringing those up get called mysoginists.

And what exactly makes you think that women have it harder? Your own experience or media and education system? I have a hard time believing that this really is the case.

And about the past part, look, I'm german. I know about the past, and I know what it means to carry a lot of baggage. But I don't want to be thrown into jail because of the bank robbery my father did before I was born. (He didn't rob a bank btw, that was just an example). That's what I meant.

@Gamer_152 said:

I have to agree with Justin McElroy on that one "For those of you saying it would be the same if they did it with a male, ask yourself, why didn't they?".

To which I would reply "but they did!". Really. Name anything, I can find you a role reversed example.

And back to the iOS game, to say it with Justin McElroys words "Why didn't they?" (do it with the roles reversed). Answer me this.

@Trilogy said:

Is the iOS certification process just hat full of papers with bad game ideas scrawled down on them?

It's pretty much like that but the hat has no hard angles.

@SlashDance said:

It's different when it's a woman. Duh.

that's like finding one of those obscure flash games where you could massacre a school and holding it up as some kind of conclusive evidence like the television news does. i guess i'm trying to say; you've been dumb and you should feel dumb and stupid.

@Mirado: You have to take into account that iOS marketplace usually bumps new games and beyond that, this game appears as the 3rd app if you search "boyfriend". So the exposure isn't necessarily small, but sure coverage such as this will probably help them reach more people. And if we guess the target audience for this game, they're probably more likely to be playing cellphone games than flash games on newsground. Also for the sake of science, I played through the game. And it by no means reflects of domestic violence as a negative as the game ends with "Congratulations, you have the perfect boyfriend! [Play Again]" For about 10 levels or so, I hit the man with various objects, strangled him and even threw a big pile of sand in his face at the beach. All levels started with an instruction that basically read; "Men are shitty when they do A and B, make him obey by inflicting violence." -- A message that just reinforce the notion that, as someone said, men are "brick walls" that can take it.

But sure, this dumb app doesn't need 2000 posts of speculation.

@Brodehouse: I think the yoghurt comparison doesn't entirely hold. I see what you're trying to say, but it's a very different thing for the companies behind one type of food to market their products towards women, than it is for the largest and most established creators in an entire art/entertainment medium to not only market their work almost exclusively towards males but also fill them with almost entirely male-centric content. I don't think this can be seen as anything but discrimination, but even if you disagree with that labelling, surely you wouldn't agree it's exactly a good thing to be happening.

@Phuturist: I understand and sympathise with the struggles of game developers trying to create works for a wider audience, but what it's easier to do and what it's best to do within the industry are two different things. I don't think what we're seeing within video games if purely the result of the restraints of the medium, not by a long shot, I think there is a clear and active effort to cater to males even within the bounds of what video games are.

I am not saying "Society is not harder on men than on women because it was harder on women a while ago", but what I am saying is that an understanding the history of the genders is important for understanding how they are treated in society today, and that the past inevitably brings with it a lot of baggage and stigmas connected with the poor treatment of women. That in no way means I want to implicate the people alive today for what the people alive centuries ago did. To some extent I think the "Who has it worse?" argument distracts from the fact that whoever has it worse, we need to break down discrimination on both sides, but my belief comes from education, research, and to some degree the things I've heard women express about the way they're treated. I think it is false to say that anyone who tries to bring objective evidence into this debate is immediately branded a misogynist, or that feminists are somehow anti-evidence.

As for the role-reversal thing, I think once again it's ignoring the larger issue to say "I can find you a role-reversed example of anything". Just because you can find me one example of discrimination against males, doesn't change the fact that there is a worrying norm of and many more examples of discrimination against females. I don't really understand what you're trying to say by role-reversing McElroy's point, as the implication of what he said was that they chose to objectify a woman because that's the general trend in the industry. This kind of logic would only apply the other way to the iOS game is if there was a larger norm and culture of people making iOS games about women beating their boyfriends, which there's not.

@rebgav: I don't think prominence of the company and content of the software are the only issues here, but what I am trying to say is that they both work in tandem. I'm not saying that this thing is entirely predicated on the stature of the offender, but what I do think is that the prominence of the company plays an important role. The kind of shit we're seeing in this iOS game isn't good at any level, but it has to be acknowledged that if a company has more influence, a larger audience, and better represents the industry than another, then they have more responsibility to do the right thing, and if they don't it's going to be far more damaging. Of course that's only part of the argument here, but I entirely disagree with the implication in this thread that this one-off instance of a no-name iOS developer making a game where you cartoonishly beat men, is equivalent to the years of female exclusion in the gaming audience, questionable depiction of women, and off-hand dismissal of serious gender issues throughout the industry and even by many of the biggest companies.

@Gamer_152 said:

@Brodehouse: I think the yoghurt comparison doesn't entirely hold. I see what you're trying to say, but it's a very different thing for the companies behind one type of food to market their products towards women, than it is for the largest and most established creators in an entire art/entertainment medium to not only market their work almost exclusively towards males but also fill them with almost entirely male-centric content. I don't think this can be seen as anything but discrimination, but even if you disagree with that labelling, surely you wouldn't agree it's exactly a good thing to be happening.

It's not discrimination, because it doesn't fit the criteria for discrimination. The yogurt comparison actually holds exactly; companies are free to market their products to whatever demographic they want. Entire industries are not beholden to play to an equality of outcomes (whether or not they like it), but an equality of opportunities (whether or not they can use the product). Hockey equipment is largely unisex, but hockey equipment companies are going to market almost exclusively to men, because men make up over 95% of the market. Marketing to your largest market is not discrimination. Under your incorrect definition of discrimination, hockey equipment would have to market to women to the same degree, even if they make up a tiny fraction of the market. They would have to market to people who live in non-winter climes, as well as winter climes. This is an absurd obligation.

Here's what living in a free society with free expression means; you can't actually bully or censor someone into saying the things you want to hear. This goes for artistic expression. If I want to write a story where all the characters are men, without a lot of content that women might consider 'female-centric', that's my right. And it's the audience's right whether or not they wish to pay me whatever amount of dollars to partake. If I wrote a story where all the characters were female, and all the content was 'female-centric', an attempt to get me to rewrite it and add more men in there would be seen exactly for what it is; censorship. This isn't discrimination, this is free expression and equality.

I understand you're a sensitive, liberal guy, I am too. That's why I feel this way. Free expression is a right, having someone make something that fits your interests because nothing else does is not a right. It may be a savvy business decision, almost all business success comes from identifying a new, underutilized market and exploiting it. But that's also not a mandate. We can't have the government going "you better create art that women enjoy!" any more than we could have the government going "you better create art that men enjoy!" This is what freedom entails.

@Brodehouse: I don't think I'm bullying anyone, I've not called for censorship, and I certainly don't think I've called for the government to start ordering people what to create. I often see the criticism of the games industry in situations like this construed as censorship, and it's not. I don't think that freedom and equality are the same thing, but people have free expression, what they do not have are a freedom from criticism, a freedom from it being pointed out that their work is poor or damaging, or freedom from outside parties expressing what they think they should do. I think the hockey equipment example falls down for the same reason the yoghurt one does; an entire art or entertainment industry is not comparable to the people manufacturing one type of sporting good, and it's virtually impossible to create a male-centric hockey stick. Sure, you can market it to men, but how much hockey stick marketing is there really out there in comparison to games marketing, and how exactly do you gear the content of a hockey stick to men? It's very hard to say you can change the hockey stick itself in such a way that it would not be appealing to women in general, the same cannot be said of video games. It also cannot be said that the hockey stick industry has the same cultural or societal relevance as the entertainment industry.

@Gamer_152 said:

@Brodehouse: I don't think I'm bullying anyone, I've not called for censorship, and I certainly don't think I've called for the government to start ordering people what to create. I often see the criticism of the games industry in situations like this construed as censorship, and it's not. I don't think that freedom and equality are the same thing, but people have free expression, what they do not have are a freedom from criticism, a freedom from it being pointed out that their work is poor or damaging, or freedom from outside parties expressing what they think they should do. I think the hockey equipment example falls down for the same reason the yoghurt one does; an entire art or entertainment industry is not comparable to the people manufacturing one type of sporting good, and it's virtually impossible to create a male-centric hockey stick. Sure, you can market it to men, but how much hockey stick marketing is there really out there in comparison to games marketing, and how exactly do you gear the content of a hockey stick to men? It's very hard to say you can change the hockey stick itself in such a way that it would not be appealing to women in general, the same cannot be said of video games. It also cannot be said that the hockey stick industry has the same cultural or societal relevance as the entertainment industry.

You are free to criticize, but as I stated earlier, I see absolutely no rational merit in a criticism whose thesis is that "X wouldn't enjoy this, it's damaging to X that you don't make things they enjoy". That's nonsense. Creating something that appeals to Group X and not Group Y does not discriminate against Group Y. Nintendo making kids games rather than M games does not discriminate against people who like M games. Making games that appeal to women does not discriminate against men simply because they don't appeal to them. Follow your logic. That logic says that a demographic is being 'damaged' if it is not having content created that appeals to it, moreover that the creation of content that does not appeal to it qualifies as discrimination. People Who Love N64 Games (demographic) are being damaged because there is no content being created that appeals to them (N64 games), and they are being discriminated against because WiiU games are being made. Women are being damaged because there is no content being created that appeals to them, and they are being discriminated against because content is being created that does not appeal to them. It is a complete logical fallacy.

Your 'size' argument is a red herring, the size of the industry does not change the core fact that targeting to a specific demographic is not discrimination. Ethics are not attached to market share, the size of the hockey industry compared to the games industry is not relevant to the core assertion that targeting a specific market to appeal to is not discrimination. The core principles of mathematics do not change because the numbers have doubled, it's the same for logic. If it is ethically reasonable to market directly to a demographic in the small scale, it remains ethically reasonable to do it on the wide scale. 'Cultural or societal relevance' has nothing to do with fundamental logic. In the same way yogurt companies don't have to create yogurt that appeals to men (or women), and hockey equipment manufacturers don't have to create equipment that appeals to women (or men), game companies are under no obligation to create content that appeals to any demographic. Whoever they choose to target and attempt to appeal to is their prerogative.

We talk about entitlement, let me just break something down here; you do not have the right to demand something appeal to you. You can like something, or not, and then act accordingly. But this insistence that a company is ethically bound to create a product that will appeal to me is the definition of entitlement. This does not appeal to X, it must be changed until it appeals to X, because X is X. Substitute whichever group you wish. Substitute 'white' and then see if it sounds remotely acceptable to you.

@Gamer_152: Right. It's fine, I get it. I still think there is no discrimination against women in video game content on purpose though. Boys like technology and computers more than girls in general, video games are something that uses and needs technology. Creating video games requires a whole lot of love for technology, leading to most of the video game developers being male.

Now, if I would write a story, I would have a harder time writing a female protagonist than a male one. Since most of the people working in the video game industry are male, there are a lot of male characters. On the other hand, female writers like Rhianon something something, seem to write mostly female characters. It's not discriminating, it's just easier that way.

So if you feel the need to change that, where do you start? Teach more girls to love computers when they are young? We are trying to do that already in our education system. Make games specifically for women that will probably not sell well in an industry that suffers from bad sales if you are not the third sequel in a AAA franchise? Hard to do. Hire female developers? I am pretty sure they take every chance, nobody wants to work in an office with only guys. Most of the marriages start at your job, so...

It's just hard to do, it's not mean spirited intend.

Also, to the who gets discriminated, on my way to University, three things happened:

1. In my car, I heard the radio say, that single unemployed women get substantially more wellfare money than single unemployed men. That's because of the "you get less if you do not take 'acceptable' jobs" rule that we have in germany. The employes in the Job Centers seem to feel that some jobs are acceptable for men, but not for women, therefore unfair treatment.

2. There was a free parking space directly in front of the building, but it was for women only. Because they are in danger I guess, even though most of the people getting jumped are men. Well I had to park 500 meters further away.

3. I walked by a poster for a state financed "women in science network" for "making connections to help get better jobs". You know, so that they get hired because they know the person handling the employment. But I am not allowed to partake because of my gender. And it's financed by my taxes. Of course, there is no male equivalent.

Do you really think, society treats women so much worse than men so that it makes up for all of that?

How is all of this shit up there even legal? "Everyone is equal before the law" right?

And with that and your possible reply, let's end this conversation. It's been ok.

As a male, I often find myself extremely disgusted, on the verge of vomiting, by some things that some other males write, say or do.

If someone feels I'm being unfair to them, sorry. I'm Just venting a bit, so don't mind me. Though I know you won't, since you're dead set on preserving your system of beliefs.

@Gamer_152 said:

The whole "The games industry says it's only sexist if it's a woman" idea that's being expressed in here is a total strawman, when has anything like that been implied?

"Come on, guys, it's different when it's a woman." ~ Patrick Klepek, 2013.

Or you may want to acknowledge that it's not only the video game industry, but mostofthemodernworld as a whole deems it sexist only if a woman is on the receiving end.

@Fattony12000 said:

At the end, you get to choose whether or not ejaculate on her body or deposit the semen directly into her womb, because Boob Wars wants to make sure you're complicit in this behavior.

http://www.destructoid.com/review-boob-wars-big-breasts-vs-flat-chests-243413.phtml

I tried, but I couldn't find your point in relation to this topic.

@Undeadpool said:

@SlashDance said:

It's different when it's a woman. Duh.

@Sooty said:

Sorry it's only sexist if it's a woman. - gaming industry logic

How to build a better strawman.

A strawman argument is misrepresenting someone's opinion, which isn't being done, SlashDance is giving an exact quote from Patrick's Dead Island article, which Patrick used to dismiss the hypocrisy that no one would be making a fuss if the genders were reversed. This is an example of genders being reversed. Where does the misrepresenting come in?

@Gamer_152: I gotta say duder, you typically champion equality in a totally rational manner, but the way you're being so dismissive of this is coming across really hypocritical. Sure iPhone games are really small scale, but that doesn't diminish what's wrong with it. You certainly had your piece to say about the Dead Island statue and I would hardly say that game is in the "upper echelons of the games industry," as you put it. Even if it were, a region exclusive collectors edition pack-in (a relatively small region in terms of sales at that) is hardly something that anyone would have ever talked about if the content hadn't been so objectionable.

As a guy, I dont give a shit. I dont think we need any more amunition in the gender wars personally, just leave it be. I'm not saying the solution to intolerance is to just ignore it but in this particular case it isnt worth getting upset over.

(but who am I kidding, this is the internet!)

I didn't care about sexism in videogames when people were complaining about big tits on a statue, so I'm certainly not going to pretend to care now.

@Hunter5024: Yeah, I took high school debate too! Ah-heh, seeing as how they didn't reference Patrick directly, particularly the one who says "GAMES INDUSTRY LOGIC," they (along with everyone else who fundamentally misunderstands feminism/cherry picks the most extreme examples to make themselves look better) seem to be inferring that that is a wider reaching view than just one man or one site. Even if the other fellow IS referencing him, that's such a generic statement (and I just re-read the Dead Island article, he doesn't say that ANYwhere) that there'd be basically no way to know off-hand unless you were hunched over every article he's written looking for flaws in his armor.

So yeah, it's a strawman because it's an argument that almost always gets made by people trying to make feminists look foolish/irrational but never actually made outside the fringes of ACTUAL feminism. Also: your argument is poorly phrased, I can barely tell what you're actually trying to say. Oh and while we're being pedantic: you've got a misplaced apostrophe.

Good thing I abandoned that sexist iOs a long time ago.

@L44 said:

Uh oh.

@coakroach said:

Oh no.

Shit just looks mean spirited and not funny.

@Undeadpool said:

@Hunter5024: Yeah, I took high school debate too! Ah-heh, seeing as how they didn't reference Patrick directly, particularly the one who says "GAMES INDUSTRY LOGIC," they (along with everyone else who fundamentally misunderstands feminism/cherry picks the most extreme examples to make themselves look better) seem to be inferring that that is a wider reaching view than just one man or one site. Even if the other fellow IS referencing him, that's such a generic statement (and I just re-read the Dead Island article, he doesn't say that ANYwhere) that there'd be basically no way to know off-hand unless you were hunched over every article he's written looking for flaws in his armor.

So yeah, it's a strawman because it's an argument that almost always gets made by people trying to make feminists look foolish/irrational but never actually made outside the fringes of ACTUAL feminism. Also: your argument is poorly phrased, I can barely tell what you're actually trying to say. Oh and while we're being pedantic: you've got a misplaced apostrophe.

Yeah he did. In the original article and not the follow up

"You can make the argument that no one would be outraged if this was a male torso with the same lack of bodily features, but c'mon. It’s different when it’s a woman, this is over the line, and Deep Silver should have known better." - Partick Klepek.

@Undeadpool said:

@Hunter5024: Yeah, I took high school debate too! Ah-heh, seeing as how they didn't reference Patrick directly, particularly the one who says "GAMES INDUSTRY LOGIC," they (along with everyone else who fundamentally misunderstands feminism/cherry picks the most extreme examples to make themselves look better) seem to be inferring that that is a wider reaching view than just one man or one site. Even if the other fellow IS referencing him, that's such a generic statement (and I just re-read the Dead Island article, he doesn't say that ANYwhere) that there'd be basically no way to know off-hand unless you were hunched over every article he's written looking for flaws in his armor.

So yeah, it's a strawman because it's an argument that almost always gets made by people trying to make feminists look foolish/irrational but never actually made outside the fringes of ACTUAL feminism. Also: your argument is poorly phrased, I can barely tell what you're actually trying to say. Oh and while we're being pedantic: you've got a misplaced apostrophe.

I was just being facetious.

@LikeaSsur said:

@Gamer_152 said:

The whole "The games industry says it's only sexist if it's a woman" idea that's being expressed in here is a total strawman, when has anything like that been implied?

"Come on, guys, it's different when it's a woman." ~ Patrick Klepek, 2013.

Or you may want to acknowledge that it's not only the video game industry, but mostofthemodernworld as a whole deems it sexist only if a woman is on the receiving end.

@Fattony12000 said:

At the end, you get to choose whether or not ejaculate on her body or deposit the semen directly into her womb, because Boob Wars wants to make sure you're complicit in this behavior.

http://www.destructoid.com/review-boob-wars-big-breasts-vs-flat-chests-243413.phtml

I tried, but I couldn't find your point in relation to this topic.

Wait someone used this game to show how fucked up hentai games are? This one is harmless regarding woman and their presentation in it compared to real hardcore stuff XD

i don't care these people dont have real feelings

Some foul things leaked out of this thread and I'm not even talkin' about the lame H-game. Can we, like, torch this thing now and call it a day?

Please?

@SlashDance: Haw! I love it!

@PulledaBrad: Okay. One guy's opinion (which I have on-and-off feelings about, most especially because if they'd sexualized a male torso in the same way, I think the outrage would've taken on a distinctly different tenor). Too bad Patrick isn't Emperor of Feminism, particularly since the user being referenced was being facetious and I was mostly referring to the second quote.

@Sooty said:

Sorry it's only sexist if it's a woman. - 95% of society logic

Fixed. Sad but true. Let's not delude ourselves into thinking that this is a problem limited to gaming culture.

But back on topic, let's also not delude ourselves into thinking that one iOS game is comparable to the incidents regarding sexism that have been created at large publishers and organisations with much larger influence in the industry. It is 100% true that sexual discrimination is just as wrong as sexual discrimination against women; in a idealistic sense, gender discrimination does not/should not discriminate. If you want to relate it to racial discrimination, it's the difference between MLK and Malcolm X. But that's not the reality we live in, and most cases of sexism in society are disproportionately oriented to suppressing or belittling women. This game is dumb and almost no one will play it, and it's a heavily isolated incident. Games that have generated controversy as regards sexism towards women - Tomb Raider, Hitman, and to a lesser extent, Dead Island - are million dollar franchises played by enthusiasts and casual alike. Not the same issue.

It's important to keep a sense of perspective on the entire issue. For one thing, let's all remember that feminism is not inherently a movement that represents 51% of the global population, despite the feminists that may claim it does. Feminism is almost entirely a product of white middle-class intellectuals in first-world countries - i.e. the 1%. Feminism is essentially a product of a prosperous society. I'm not an expert on the subject, but I've done enough reading and thinking about this issue to come to this conclusion. Feel free to shout me down if you know more than I do.

@Undeadpool: The phrase he used was such a specific point of contention in the comments of Patrick's first article, that it was clearly being referenced. The only point I was making is that because it is an exact quote, about the very same subject, calling it a strawman argument isn't even a matter of opinion, it's a factually inaccurate statement. You might have a little more ground to stand on for the second comment, though I would still disagree with what you said, because in order to build a strawman there has to be a specific opinion to misrepresent, and Sooty was talking about a perceived collection of opinions, which is impossible to gauge.

I can't tell what was unclear or poorly phrased about my first post, but I was up way past my bed time when I wrote that. So that could account for any confusion. Also it's hardly pedantic to tell someone that they're using a term that simply doesn't apply. (PSST, now I'm being pedantic.) Not trying to pick on you or anything Corey, your comment just felt pretty dismissive, whether the original posters were being serious or not.

@Hunter5024: Ahhh for the days when I had a measure of anonymity! Let's not bring real names into this, it shatters the illusion. Anyway, I don't feel picked on at all, and this is actually blossoming into a real conversation! I'm proud of us!

I DO consider it a strawman if for no other reason than the ONLY people I ever see saying stuff like that are people who are being intentionally obtuse and who seem to think feminism is all about the suppression of the male (which it absolutely isn't and anyone who believes that is no more a feminist than anyone who believes women shouldn't be allowed to vote), so I guess I consider it a strawman because they're setting up an argument that they themselves KNOW to be flimsy and faulty, but it's not ACTUALLY representative of what their "opponent" believes. For instance: I doubt anyone with a real interest in feminism would see this game as feminist, it's not empowering women, if anything it's actually demonizing them even further, while dehumanizing men. Unless this game is a brilliant bit of satire, NO ONE should feel good about it.

@Undeadpool: I agree with what you're saying about feminism entirely, that word has been twisted into something different, and people seem to forget that it used to mean someone who supports the equal rights of men and women (which is why I think there should be a more gender neutral version of the word, but that's neither here nor there). The difference is that I don't believe that anybody is commenting on feminism, I believe they're commenting on the meta narrative that game critics have been perpetuating about sexism in the past year or so.

Sorry for using your name, I was trying to make my post more friendly, because text heavy discussions often come across angrily, and I didn't want to have to resort to one of these =)

I'd not particularly enjoy an article on this side of sexism either.

One app among a whole deluge of shit women have to put up with in the industry. Your post changes not a thing.

Does this mean I can have a victim complex too? Nah I still got dat privilege. Cant shake itttt

@Gamer_152 said:

The whole "The games industry says it's only sexist if it's a woman" idea that's being expressed in here is a total strawman, when has anything like that been implied? The difference is, while this app is pretty gross and arguably worthy of at least some attention, it doesn't have anything to do with the upper echelons of the games industry, while much of the questionable content involving women in games does, and it's not representative of an overall much larger issue, while a lot of stuff involving women in the industry has been. I don't think an app like this really merits a Patrick article, as it's not really part of a big issue or trend in the industry, it's just this weird, anomalous, all be it distasteful thing.

The "games industry says it's only sexist if it's a woman" idea doesn't need to be implied. It's an explicit stance of peoples because there is almost no precedent for a horribly disgustingly sexist game about males ever being discussed at length. Granted what people would consider horribly sexist about males is so skewed because men can be raped or mutilated or mauled in video games, and no one bats an eyelash or calls it sexist or whatever. Also everything else you said about it being weird and distasteful could be applied to the Dead Island torso thing. It was a distasteful poorly conceived work, but it didn't need the sensationalist threads that it got.

@Gamer_152 said:

The whole "The games industry says it's only sexist if it's a woman" idea that's being expressed in here is a total strawman, when has anything like that been implied? The difference is, while this app is pretty gross and arguably worthy of at least some attention, it doesn't have anything to do with the upper echelons of the games industry, while much of the questionable content involving women in games does, and it's not representative of an overall much larger issue, while a lot of stuff involving women in the industry has been. I don't think an app like this really merits a Patrick article, as it's not really part of a big issue or trend in the industry, it's just this weird, anomalous, all be it distasteful thing.

Hypocrisy at its best. Who cares if it's a ios game or a console game. Show equality even when dealing with different spectrums. If you dare complain about things being in poor taste, be universal about it. Don't let one slide more than the other. If one shouldn't exist so shouldn't the other, but do you see the can of worms that opens!?

Just dust off ALL minimal issues like these and don't buy them if you don't like them. Drop it with the ethics. Stop it with the moral rules cause theres enough of those and they only strengthen peoples desire to break them.

@LikeaSsur said:

@Fattony12000 said:

At the end, you get to choose whether or not ejaculate on her body or deposit the semen directly into her womb, because Boob Wars wants to make sure you're complicit in this behavior.

http://www.destructoid.com/review-boob-wars-big-breasts-vs-flat-chests-243413.phtml

I tried, but I couldn't find your point in relation to this topic.

ELITE SEXISIM IN VIDOE GAMES. THE OP BRINGS UP LADI BEATING BOYDUDE, WHEN THE REAL ISSUE RIGHT HERE IN 1991 IS MENS RAPING CARTOON GURLS.

Really, I just wanted more people to see this other piece of fine (or as we tend to say round these parts...STERLING) work from Jim Sterling.

You know guys. I've come around. One game out of hundreds that is sexist towards men means everyone has it bad.