Worth Reading: 09/15/2014

I don't think the point is "why don't they have the same opinion?" I think the point is that Leigh Alexander is wrong.

I haven't seen anything like that from the anti-GG crowd. Could there be some who have said that? Sure. But I would say the majority don't feel that way, like the majority of people who have adopted the GG banner don't approve of harassment.

I am a member of Gamersgate and have bought a few games from them I just checked there webpage and It still looks like a normal store to me.

I am surprised that it has caused so much controversy. Just in case I will make sure I have copys of my games installed so that if the site goes down or closes im not out of pocket.

I'm honestly curious if this shit boosted their sales.

Golf is quite a wonderful game... if not a very infuriating one. :)

@teenmother: I love that many of the articles responding to her video immediately label her as a "Conservative." As if this is supposed to strike fear in my heart and immediately invalidate her opinions.

@teenmother: Pretty fun that people like to dismiss Anita for her "I don't really like games" comment but this video, from someone who leads the video by saying that they couldn't remember the last time they played a video game, is taken as gospel. Whatever works, though!

By the way, for someone who calls themselves the "Factual Feminist", not a whole lot of facts in that video.

pretty standard, if you can't dispute the facts then attack the messenger.

crazy amount of labels and hate being thrown at the GG crowd in attempt to bypass the discussion with slurs and shouting.

@milkman: I don't give much of a care for Sommers' own personal attitudes about gaming throughout all this, but I will say the reaction has been telling for how much people turn into hypocrites and immediately try batting down a prominent female who has an opposing point of view. Immediately she's "dangerous" because she speaks up about something; if I called Anita Sarkeesian or Zoe Quinn "dangerous" I'd be called a misogynist.

Not to mention the irony of how, if a woman posted a video talking about wanting more women in video games, the reaction to men shouting down that opinion is that they're "mansplaining" and how it's such an affront that we don't let the woman speak; but queue multiple articles written by straight white men shooting Sommer's video down for being a big Conservative anti-feminist meanie and that's all well and good.

Sommers clearly doesn't know anything about video games (and Anita genuinely knows fucktons more by comparison), but there's at least a couple things in there worth keeping in mind that often go ignored:

Businesses serve their markets, and there's nothing inherently evil in that. When people talk about how "half of all gamers are women, why are they not being represented?!" that's being disingenuous, because most of those numbers come from mobile/handheld games, social games, and MMOs. Very few people are calling Candy Crush misogynistic. The market for Call of Duty is 80/20 male. Grand Theft Auto's fanbase is something like 15% female. Hell, EVE Online has a 96% male player base. Catering to those majorities with things that appeal to those majorities isn't inherently immoral. Twilight and The Hunger Games have a majority female audience and I'm not getting shocked and outraged at love triangle tropes. The audience of these games are being given violent, competitive games with attractive girls because the audience that plays these games are dudes and most dudes like girls and blowing shit up.

Hilariously, I personally am not attracted to either of those things that much!

Otherwise, the only thing I found striking from her video that I hadn't really made the connection to is that, yeah, we live in perhaps the most socially progressive generation ever and that's only accelerated rapidly. Video games were supposed to make people violent and crime has only plummeted, abuse against women has gone down with each year for over a decade, and activism in favor of protecting women in education (where they represent the majority!) and the workplace is probably greater and louder than ever. The struggle for gay rights in America moved faster than perhaps any other civil rights movement in history. The under 30-somethings may as well have had our generation baptized in video games, yet broadly speaking the bigotry and violence just keeps on shrinking. We have work left to do, but I'm feeling pretty good about that right now.

Also I like the term "concernocrat."

I find Ms. Sommers (can't find out if married or not) assertion that since games are targetd at males that they aren't sexist because they're (theortically) reaching their target audience to be at best kind of inane but mostly dissmissive of the whole point of ciriticisim in general.

@marokai said:

I dunno, I thought Sommers fell pretty short of the mark when she tried making this point. The idea that game developers would aim to appeal to their primary market might account for the overwhelming use of male protagonists, but it doesn't explain or excuse the often hideous portrayal of women when they are featured in games, which is what the vast majority of feminist critique, included Tropes Against Women, focuses on. Depicting women as weak kidnap fodder or disposable plot devices isn't appealing to your demographic, it's insulting them.

@tourgen: Can't dispute the facts? Well, that's an annoying thing to say. I didn't really want to waste anymore of my time on this video but okay, I'll bite, I guess.

Consider just one typical data sample: Researchers at UCLA have been studying the pastimes of college freshmen for more than 40 years. For incoming freshmen, 65 percent of girls but fewer than 19 percent of boys said they played no video games at all in a typical week. Among hardcore gamers who play more than 20 hours a week, the ratio of boys to girls is 7 to 1. This huge gender gap has persisted since the researchers first started asking about video games in the mid-1990s—and it looks like it’s here to stay.

Yep, this is mostly true. If you just look at the "hardcore" games market, there are definitely more male gamers than female gamers. Where you draw the line of what is a hardcore game and what it a casual game is where you get into trouble. But for the sake of the argument, let's concede that point. Now, the issue here is that the whole purpose of things like Feminist Frequency's videos is to find out WHY such a gap exists. What is it about games that attracts so many more men than women? Our Factual Feminist friend doesn't seem too concerned with the why so I'll answer for her. It's a pretty obvious answer that I'm sure is evident to pretty much anyone who plays video games but the vast majority of games are told from a male perspective and are about male fantasies. You play as the (male) hero, you save the princess, you beat the bad guy. All that good stuff. That does not mean that these games are sexist or misogynist but it's just the facts.

Let's recap, so far, we've established that men play more traditional, "hardcore" video games than women. Parts of that statement are debatable but it's mostly fine.

But are video games rife with sexism? Do they promote a culture of misogyny and violence that must be dismantled? My answer is no.

I assume some facts are going to follow this statement. No? Okay, moving on, I guess.

For years, games such as Grand Theft Auto and Call of Duty were said to cause violence, even though no one was able to establish a clear correlation. Those concerns died down when Psychological Bulletin published a major article in 2010 declaring the video game scare “much ado about nothing.” One graph showed that as video games have surged in popularity, youth crime has plummeted.

I thought we were talking about sexism. No one is disputing this. No games critic is saying that video games are causing the rise of youth crime or violence. Completely irrelevant point.

These critics are concerned that gaming is a largely hetero-patriachal capitalist pursuit. Why isn’t gaming more inclusive? Why must there always be male heroes? Why are the few females always portrayed as either Damsels in distress or sex objects? These critics have made some useful points about “sexist tropes and narratives.” But they ignore the fact that the world of gaming has become more inclusive. There are games that fit a vast array of preferences, and games with responsibly proportioned and appropriately garbed female protagonists.

Prove it. There is literally nothing to back this statement up. This statement in the video is followed by brief clips of Final Fantasy 13, Super Mario Bros.(?), Mirror's Edge, some sexy lady eyes from some game I've never seen before and...cars? It's very easy to just say something. Show me how games have become more inclusive. Because, spoiler alert, they absolutely have! It's undeniable that more games now feature strong female characters than have in the past. But it's still not even close to equal. Has the fact that video games have gotten better mean that we should all just shut up about it now?

Yet the video game gender police have become harsh and intolerant. Many of them want more than more women on both sides of the video screen—they want the male video game culture to end.

Quite the leap from "they want more women making games" to "they want men to go away."

Imagine if a group of gender critics attacked women-centered shows like Oprah or The View, or women’s magazines, for privileging the female perspective and treating men like “the other.” The fans might be tempted to tell them to bug off—and find their own shows. That is what many gamers did. And most did it with logic and evidence and humor.

Fucking yikes. Okay, there's a huge difference here. Oprah and The View are women-centric shows in a sea of of male-centric shows. The common misconception from people is that they seem to think that these "gender activists and hipsters with degrees in cultural studies", as our friend so eloquently puts it in the video, wants these male-centric games to go away. No one is trying to eradicate Call of Duty from existence. It's about making the art form of games more inclusive. Having alternatives to these male fantasies. You know, like how there's The View for women and for men, there's Pardon the Interruption on ESPN or something like that. It's about having something for everyone.

Also, I think it's pretty lame that games would have to segregate themselves with hard gender lines that we see a lot in mediums like TV. Why can't games be better than that? So, no, women who want games to be inclusive should not "bug off and find their own shows." It's their hobby just as much as it's ours.

My suggestion to their critics: stand down.

Hard pass.

@conmulligan: I generally agree on your last point; it can be insulting to everyone's intelligence.

@milkman: Where you draw the line of what is a hardcore game and what it a casual game is where you get into trouble. But for the sake of the argument, let's concede that point. Now, the issue here is that the whole purpose of things like Feminist Frequency's videos is to find out WHY such a gap exists. What is it about games that attracts so many more men than women? Our Factual Feminist friend doesn't seem too concerned with the why so I'll answer for her. It's a pretty obvious answer that I'm sure is evident to pretty much anyone who plays video games but the vast majority of games are told from a male perspective and are about male fantasies.

You don't actually get into trouble drawing the demographic line between hardcore and casual. you make this assertion but the facts say otherwise.

http://www.datagenetics.com/blog/december12010/

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/3698805/Reports/2012_CGA_SocialSector.pdf

http://www.nielsen.com/content/dam/corporate/us/en/newswire/uploads/2009/09/GamerReport.pdf

"It's pretty obvious..." isn't a real argument. That's the classic "common sense fallacy". You will need to provide some actual facts or research to back up the cause->effect chain you are claiming. You will have to do better than Anita's videos. They provide no sources to actual research.

http://corkskeptics.org/2011/05/03/the-common-sense-fallacy/

Coincidentally this is where the research pertaining to long term effects of video game usage on behavior and attitude comes in. Research indicates there is no correlation between video games and long-term behavior. The majority of the research has been focused on violent behavior. I am 100% all for studies to be expanded to sexism and any other -isms, but the basic research into human cognition is generally the same.

This is the same stuff Jack Thompson got railroaded out of town for! Christ. Do we really have to do this again?

But are video games rife with sexism? Do they promote a culture of misogyny and violence that must be dismantled? My answer is no.

I assume some facts are going to follow this statement. No? Okay, moving on, I guess.

She was making the point that video games do not promote violence, sexism, or any other long term shift in behavior. Based on over 25 years of research. There are a number of meta-reviews of this research available. It's not hard to research this stuff.

http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=meta+review+of+behavior+and+video+games&hl=en&as_sdt=0&as_vis=1&oi=scholart&sa=X&ei=t2YaVNPoMdLgsATDroKACg&ved=0CB0QgQMwAA

[...]There are games that fit a vast array of preferences, and games with responsibly proportioned and appropriately garbed female protagonists.

Prove it. There is literally nothing to back this statement up. This statement in the video is followed by brief clips of Final Fantasy 13, Super Mario Bros.(?), Mirror's Edge, some sexy lady eyes from some game I've never seen before and...cars? It's very easy to just say something. Show me how games have become more inclusive. Because, spoiler alert, they absolutely have! It's undeniable that more games now feature strong female characters than have in the past. But it's still not even close to equal. Has the fact that video games have gotten better mean that we should all just shut up about it now?

I assume that's the assertion you feel needs proving? Alright, how about the top google hit. It's a pretty good list considering female gamers are a minority consumer of core/hardcore games.

http://geekfeminism.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_Women_Characters_in_Video_Games

Concerning your last two sentences: Why do you feel it should be equal if males are ~70% of the core gaming population? Men and women are interested in different things. That's not a crime. Games taken as a whole, including all the casual and neutral games (cars, cards, puzzles, etc) are quite friendly to everyone.

No one is asking anyone to shut up. Personally I'm just asking for a reasonable discussion without baseless assertions, name calling, and shaming. I like blowing shit up, latex, and automatic weapons. I won't apologize for that. I want people to make games that include what I like and not feel like they need to apologize for it either.

The rest of the TV nonsense. You make some claims on the # of television shows targeted at male vs. female and I'm not seeing that backed up with any real data. I don't watch TV so I don't know.

No one is trying to eradicate Call of Duty from existence. It's about making the art form of games more inclusive.

First sentence is a straw man argument. No one ever said that. Easy to argue against though I guess?

You claim it's all about making the art form more inclusive. Yet I have many examples of actions taken that prove otherwise. There have been specific actions taken by bloggers and activists to target and suppress or change people's art. Here's an example:

http://orogion.deviantart.com/journal/Save-the-Boob-plate-380891149

It's a minor thing. An exposed mid-rift on some cover art. And when the artist was strong-armed into changing it they gave the artist shit about the breasts.

Hard pass.

Yeah, whatever. Right back at you.

@tourgen:

When I said you get into trouble drawing the line between hardcore and casual, I meant the games, not the demographics. Is World of Warcraft a casual game or a hardcore game? Those kind of questions.

"It's pretty obvious..." isn't a real argument. That's the classic "common sense fallacy". You will need to provide some actual facts or research to back up the cause->effect chain you are claiming. You will have to do better than Anita's videos. They provide no sources to actual research.

Are you saying that you need proof that video games predominately feature more male protagonists or are more often told from a male perspective? Sorry, saying that is pretty obvious is not a common sense fallacy. It IS pretty obvious.

I assume that's the assertion you feel needs proving? Alright, how about the top google hit. It's a pretty good list considering female gamers are a minority consumer of core/hardcore games.

A list of female characters is not proof of anything beyond that video games have female characters. No one disputed that.

Look, I'm not going to quote and respond to every point you made here but I think the crux of what you're saying is that not as many women play games so it makes sense that they don't cater to them. Correct?

Okay, that's fine and you know, you're right. Developers have absolutely no responsibility to cater to ANYONE. Infinity Ward can say tomorrow, "fuck women, we don't want you playing our games anyway!" And that would be their right. But the right to do what you want with your art is not the right to not have your art be criticized. You can present whatever numbers you want but truthfully, I don't give a shit about demographics. The fact of the matter is that there is a vocal group of men and women who are tired of the lazy ways that video games portray gender. Just because something is reaching the audience that it's trying to reach doesn't mean that it's exempt from being criticized. This is not "suppressing" art. It is critique because that's what critics do. I don't know what percentage of the gaming audience this is and again, I really don't care. If it's insignificant number, ignore them and they'll go away, right? Good luck.

When people say things like "stand down", they are the ones doing the suppressing. You claim no one is asking anyone to shut up but that's exactly what that video does.

I want people to make games that include what I like

Yeah, dude. That's all anyone wants. I don't get why that's so hard for people to understand.

I find myself arguing a LOT against the tone of the social justice movement coming from game journalists and feminists these days, and I have to say I feel the exact same way watching this video. And I feel that way about Anita Sarkeesian's videos. And I feel that way about thunderfoot's videos. And I feel that way about most of the many articles on the topic that Patrick chooses to link to and promote.

Can't anyone talk about these subjects without the insulting, generalizing, misrepresenting, condescending, "I'm right and you're wrong" bullshit? All anyone ever seems to want to do is preach to the choir, and I'm getting sick of it.

@milkman: alright, it looks like we have some common ground.

The common sense argument you were making, if I'm understanding you correctly, was that the demographic rift in core gamers exists Because the majority of core games are told from a males perspective and indulge in a male-centered fantasy.

Maybe. I don't think that is obvious though. I am perfectly happy enjoying games with female protagonists. The difference in perspective is what I find interesting actually. But maybe the same isn't true in general? I don't know. I'd like to see an actual study or two.

But consider this, maybe it isn't something so simple as protagonist and story. Maybe it's something to do with the details of how the games are constructed (and how that has evolved historically) that draw more men than women. Maybe it's what you are doing second to second, minute to minute, hour to hour in a game. After all plenty of women are enjoying Some types of games, just not the "core" big-budget in the same # as men. Is it the borderline autistic task of collecting feathers in AC1?

I'd love to see someone run this to ground, using actual research and even a tiny bit of intellectual integrity.

Gaming is billions of dollars. Let's blow this thing up. We are already larger than movies. We can go bigger. More women buying core games and core games getting better gameplay is a win all around.

You feel that Sommer's video is telling people to shut up and stand down, cease criticism. Yes, I believe she is saying this too. And it needs to be said. Criticism is fine, but it needs to be well considered and logical. I think the clickbait bloggers have strayed over the line on this point. I want to link this story from one artist's experience with this type of criticism again:

http://orogion.deviantart.com/journal/Save-the-Boob-plate-380891149

Again, criticism is fine. But when it isn't based in any logically consistent argument and side-steps facts for "I know misogyny when I see it" people shouldn't listen. Sommer's is calling this type of criticism out. I will be there to do the same.

Right now I'm shadow-banned on Reddit and perma-banned on 4chan for doing this. FUCKING 4CHAN /b/ banned! For asking questions and pointing out leaps in logic, name-calling, and general ass-hattery.

The fact that I'm not silenced on Giant Bomb (yet), in a Patrick post of all places, is not lost on me.

@milkman: After watching her video, what I came away with is that she:

• makes some salient points;
• provides information that are factually correct, sometimes backed up, sometimes not;
• provides information that are not factual correct;
• cites some bad examples that don't support her argument;
• makes some bad leaps of logic.

She essentially is doing the same as Anita. The difference is she's critiquing Anita and other feminists instead of games. It's easier for some people to completely write off everything without regard to the times she is correct, much like some people attack Anita without actually critiquing her work, and recognizing that while it is a flawed piece of work, there are some things that we can take away from it for the better.

I definitely don't agree with her last point regarding not critiquing video games. I personally feel that it could be improved upon with better research and editing.

@mast: There are two fallacies in your post.

1) You assume that talking about these issues somehow magically makes "games talk" go away.

2) You assume that the gaming community at large has any intention of denying females from "having whatever they want from games".

Female gamers are very welcome. Ill-informed, emotionally charged crusades and vitriolic tabloid journalism is not.

Here's an excerpt from an interview with Amy Hennig of Uncharted fame.

"Woman in a man's world: As one of very few women in senior creative positions in the video game industry, Hennig is often asked about sexism and challenges she has faced. But she says it's not an issue. "Usually it has been men who gave me the opportunities I have had. I think this is a young enough and progressive enough industry that there just isn't any of that."

But that doesn't mean her perspective as a woman doesn't come in handy on design teams dominated by men, including on Uncharted 2, which features two prominent female characters. "There was an issue with breast size sometimes. I would say to the modelers, 'Let's take it down. How about a C [cup]?' " http://articles.latimes.com/2010/feb/07/business/la-fi-himi7-2010feb07

And the latter point is her personal opinion. There are women, like Mariel Cartwright the lead animator of Skullgirls, who like "sexualised" depictions of female characters. Nothing wrong with it.

Makes you wonder why nobody ever mentions this in conversations about the matter.

What seems to be happening is that a vocal minority of people in powerful positions wants to establish their subjective views as a rule of how we are supposed to think about the various facets of gaming that they keep bringing up.

That's actually a really good post. I think I agree with all of it, even what you said about me. I especially like "Female gamers are very welcome. Ill-informed, emotionally charged crusades and vitriolic tabloid journalism is not." People need to really read that, think about it, and take it to heart.

Patrick being Patrick.

I agree with a lot of what he says here and think any real change is going to happen when people have time to reflect after all of this chaos blows over. People don't do their best thinking when they're constantly on the defensive. However I think that people are pushing so hard because even with all of the crazy out there they see this as their opportunity to have a discussion about something that, even if it hasn't been ignored, they've been largely left out of or left in the dark about. They believe if they miss this opportunity they'll be just as stereotyped and dismissed as they are now even when being civil and raising, what they see as at least, reasonable concerns.

Also the idea that people like Phil Fish are "powerless" in the games industry is nonsense. Even within the games industry there are subcultures, niches, and divided demographics, this should be obvious as there is hardly any discussions of "mobile gaming" at most of these sites and that is an enormously popular and lucrative sector of gaming. Phil Fish and others like him are not making games that make money like AAA games but to say they're "powerless" when everyone that visits these sites knows his name, tons have played his game, and everyone is ware of FEZ is just not true.

Klepeck did.

So I started my first semester of college this fall and video game websites were kind of at the back of my mind. What good timing for this nonsense to happen. I didn't have to sit through it!