Tropes vs Women: Damsel in Distress Part 3 is out.

I think you're hearing what you want to hear because not only does she mention that there are playable female characters, but she also mentions that a female damsel perpetuates existing stereotypes whereas the male one doesn't.

Women being compared to dogs was very bad though I'll agree with you there, I'd almost surely bet that someone just wanted to put a dog in cause why not, not because they wanted to compare women to dogs intentionally.

Shepard isn't a good example, really. Gender doesn't play any part of that character to any real extent beyond the selection of romantic interests and some outfit choices. That's not representative of equality as much as it is making a character beholden to a one-size-fits-all template.

Interesting perspective. I guess I would side a little with the latter group as well but I don't see the need for people to freak out about it.

oh shit!, yep im gonna do that,

That's because there is no need to freak out about it. Sarkeesian's opinion videos are just her opinions, with a presentation style slanted to support her view. But her videos do tend to attract reactionary morons, which is in part why they get so much notoriety.

Why can't we let the creative people of the world dictate their own artistic decisions and stop labelling the most benign things as sexist?

Fair enough.

Well, here's the biggest problem that I saw about this, in that she mentioned DLC Quest in there.

I covered DLC Quest extensively on my YouTube channel. It was one of the first games I did (back then I was experimenting with different mics so my voice didn't come through well, but I played all the way though that Steam Greenlight game, and that just take a shot at nearly EVERY! SINGLE! TROPE! It's also a rather fun, short game, though the Live Freemium or Die mode is the main reason to buy that game, since there is a LOT of good to be found there, even when there's not a lot of replay value to be had.

But the best thing about this is that I also know how to REACH the guy that made that game, and hopefully I can get a response from Ben out of the e-mail I just sent him (of Going Loud Studios, the team behind DLC Quest). I would love to post and read what he would say (if he responds) so people can read it.

Oh great! Here we go again....

I'll just leave these here (and yes, before you ask, I agree 100%):

I think the entire point of the series was to examine whether or not those things are actually benign. I guess one could also take the view that her videos are a benign creative thing and others are slapping negative labels on them.

But...But...But.... FEMINISM!

But yeah. Seriously. Let them do what they want. No reason to be searching for *something* sexist (even when there isn't anything)

That is the problem. To her not even satire about these tropes is allowed as long you don't have a female characters as main character. The best part was the Monkey Island mentioning but then shortly said it is a nice try but still bad because you do no play a Elaine the whole time^^

Posting TheAmazingAtheist links does nothing to strengthen your opinion.

I don't see why people can't just stop watching her videos and giving her attention. Why does every video have to cause this explosion of hate? She makes stupid videos and her opinion isn't worth listening to but I swear more people watch these videos looking for something to complain about than anything else

@benpicko: when she can complain about video games we can complain about her work. And if we ignore the people who are insulting her she has a lot of counter arguments she will never really address since she does not discuss it with other people. Only her opinion is right and nothing else matters to her. And if you act like this you sure will get a lot of backlash.

That sounds a lot like the sentiment being presented by her detractors.

I didn't post them to strengthen my opinion. My opinion is the same as yours, I just think he makes some pretty good points, especially in the second video. If you haven't watched them, you should.

I am pretty sure that many people would love to have an actual discussion but she makes it impossible. You could even write her a email and she will not responds if you do not share the same opinion as her.

Not at all. We want discussions. And we all have our own opinions.

The problem is people like her that think she is above criticism.
She feels (as evidenced by the way she reacted to criticism) that we aren't criticising her works, we're criticising her because she's a woman, and that is just not true.

Everyone is entitled to their opinions, but when their opinion is "2+2=5", then it's not really valid.

if this is your new "lol"

thumbs up!

I agree with the episode, as I did the other two. The peach game thing is not cool and the point that games these days still harbor the same issues as before is worth mentioning but I feel she did not need as much time to prove that. Then again that style better proves it's saturation even now. Sucks about how few positive example she cited, I would have liked her to go into more detail on the few examples. Get more from them. I am curious which trope she tackles next.

According to her list:

The Fighting F#@k Toy -

Interesting. Now that the main one is out of the way i'm looking forward to what she has to say on the rest of the topics.

They are just her opinions, and there's absolutely no reason to get upset at that. But she's presenting them as scientific fact to the larger world. Thats where I get pissed.

Part of her Kickstarter was to make college study guides to accompany her videos. So her hope is that this is potentially being taught in schools. Again, her opinion, being taught. And as someone who disagrees with many of her core points, it breaks my heart that some girls out there who might be sort-of into games already or just curious about the medium, become totally put off after seeing her one-sided interpretation of the horribly sexist state of things now. And people who have no concept of the games industry will see these videos and dismiss this looked-down-upon art form even more as backward and hopeless.

What we need is more people of every gender playing games. But by broadcasting Anita's opinions as facts, I fear that things will just get more divisive than ever.

Do you see no reason for people to get upset at Fox News? Same thing just a much smaller sphere of influence.

Ok, now THIS is a video to watch

I suspect most people who complain about others "presenting opinion as fact" are fairly young, or at the very least not very familiar with what they're complaining about. Practically the whole field of literary and social criticism is "opinion", and you can bet that a lot of that shows up in college courses (and that's a good thing!).

It would be one thing if the videos claimed to be scientific, statistical studies, but since they didn't claim to be, it's your own fault if you try to insist otherwise.

While this video is, by far, the strongest of the three she has put out, it still fails to jump the hurdles missed by the previous two videos. Much like the others, Part 3 focuses on a list of video games that follow the trope of damsels in distress rather than actually dissecting the issue itself.

Her intended argument (or thesis) has something to do with not only the pervasiveness of the damsel in distress trope in video games but also how the continuation of this trope solidifies pre-existing gender roles while simultaneously smothering the voice of female characters. This is what I have gathered from watching all three videos.

If this was an academic paper, she would not have convinced me fully. In reality, these videos prove the thesis of "video games continually reuse the trope of damsels in distress which is potentially damaging to the role of women in the medium." Essentially the difference is that the former attempts to seriously understand the origin and effects of a stereotype and offers some sort of a solution, while the latter focuses on stating that the trope exists in a creative medium while also stating that its existence is probably bad. If it's not obvious, the first thesis is by far the stronger of the two.

In essence, the evidence she presents, and her analysis of it, falls short of proving what I think is her intended thesis. If I were her, I would have listed a few games that demonstrate the trope and then focus on how this trope is viewed by female gamers and if it affects their lives. Furthermore, I would question why this trope exists. Is it because the creators of the content are secretly trying to push a misogynistic agenda or is it unintentional. If it's the former, then we have a problem (what are some possible solutions?). If it's the latter, is the trope actually damaging (obvious questions don't always have simple answers)? What are some solutions? She proposed a story idea but it still starts with the trope. She praised video games like Fez for being throwbacks to the 2D era that don't follow the damsel in distress narrative, but they never actually address the trope. Am I suppose to think that ignoring the trope means a further step towards gender equality? If that is the solution, then I am fine with it but her game idea does not conform to this solution.

Her quest is noble, anybody can see that, but the execution of her analysis still lags a bit behind her desired outcome. This video is better, but there is still a lot of room for improvement.

Fuckin' seriously! Damn women being all stupid and shit, they should stay in the kitchen making sandwiches, much safer there.

I said it in the last thread about this topic, but I wish more people had your reaction. The way to show up Anita is to do what she did BUT BETTER, instead of making pedantic "rebuttal" videos that intentionally misunderstand and exaggerate every little hiccup.

If I've learned anything, its that playing a whole game which goal is to save a person is a boring and overused.

I thought it fit so much better in this thread.

@elwoodan: And it's SO overused that it took one person three different videos to tell all of us how MUCH it apparently was!

i agree.

Ok, I just watched this video. Here's the cliff notes version:

Her main worry is that game developers themselves are being accused of being horrible misogynists (she also admits that Anita doesn't say this directly, but rather might imply it). She spends a lot of time saying that while there are very few women in game development, but the game developers she has met with are very polite, wonderful people. She then goes on to guess that male-oriented games are so common mostly because the developers are predominantly male, and finally that you can't force change through brute-force social pressure.

All in all not a bad statement, but I think she misses the point a little bit. Game Developers could very well be mostly innocent in this, but if market forces and blind tradition are producing such horribly clichéd gender roles for women, it's still a problem worth addressing. And as even this YouTuber admits, Anita really isn't explicitly pointing at any one person or group as being a horrible misogynist. It's the overall trends that matter.

The problem with the status quo is that it never sees itself as having a problem. Agitators and advocates for causes not recognized by the status quo will always be met with some irritation, and seen as stirring shit up that didn't need to be stirred.

Oh yeah, don't get me wrong. I totally agree with you. Absolutely nothing to freak out over. "Gamers" are just a passionate group of people. Whether or not that passion is often misplaced is up for debate, but they (we? us?) tend to go on the offensive when they feel they and/or the thing they love are being attacked.

Two words for you - confirmation bias.

I'm afraid you'll have to be more specific.

She really likes that shirt

Her (Anita's) argument can be summed up into two words: confirmation bias.

When you specifically looks for something everywhere, you tend to find it everywhere.

@stonyman65: says the person who posted three videos all disagreeing with Sarkeesian in the first place.

You'll get no argument from me that Anita's videos are devoid of statistical information, and someone should absolutely do something more rigorous with this subject.

Still, as a subjective critical analysis of culture, the large number of examples Anita was able to find surely present a good start.

I think when you break it down the more reasonable of Anita's critics actually agree with her more reasonable fans as to what her flaws are.

Where they diverge is this: I think her heart is in the right place, her goals are positive, and the change she's asking for will make for a better games industry and better stories overall. And she won't be the one on the forefront making the changes either, she's just trying to shine a flashlight on a particularly rotten spot. I can't see how raising awareness like this can be anything but a net positive.

Just because I disagree with them doesn't mean that I have confirmation bias. I'm disagree with them because they are A) poorly researched, B) contradict themselves (or rather Anita contradicts herself) and C) don't really make that much sense at all.

That's not confirmation bias, that's constructive criticism. And I'm not the only one who feels that way, in fact there are hundreds of videos (and forum posts both here and on other gaming forums) that level the exact same criticisms.

I've only watched about four of the 'rebuttal' videos, but every one that I've seen is mostly arguing against positions that Anita herself never stated, and seem to exist to catch the wave of anti-Anita sentiment and the views that go with that, rather than out of any really strong counter-arguments.

Again, that's just constructive criticism :)

In the last two videos she was much more expressive. I tried playing my "pause the video to look at funny faces" game with this one, but it wasn't as fun. I'm glad to see that she spoiled fewer games with this video, so I can actually watch it, but I've pretty much lost all interest in this trope, so I wasn't able to get all the way through. Maybe I'll watch again when she does a less obvious trope. Also, she should use some of that $160,000 to buy herself a new shirt, were these all filmed in the same day? They seem kind of far apart for that.

well, watch this one then.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJeX6F-Q63I

Oh GOD. To think I used to have some respect for "Thunderfoot"; you'd think he'd know not to employ straw men so blatantly.

You must not have watched the whole video because it's almost 20 minutes long and I only posted it 3 minutes ago.

Why don't you watch the damn video before you post snarky comments about it.

I saw that video a few months ago.

Edit: Re: the sexual dimorphism thing (I think this came up in the last thread, but here we are again):

It's obvious that when Anita is protesting to women being called the "weaker sex", she's referring to more than the sheer amount of force that can be produced from the upper arm of the average man vs. woman. She's taking into account emotional intelligence, collaborative social abilities, and maybe even higher pain threshold (which is something women have, I'm told).

When a "rebutter" refuses to try to understand a statement in anything but the most rigid terms from the perspective he defines, it comes off as lame-brained and pedantic. When I was complaining about stupid rebuttal videos earlier, this is exactly the one I had in mind, actually.

He was so brilliant once.