GTA V's satirical anti-feminist humor - Your thoughts?

Remember the Republican Space Rangers from GTA IV? Well, with a presidential administration comes a new target, and one portion of the talk radio station does the same thing for feminism, liberals, and political correctness.

Starts at 27:35

With the large focus on sexism and feminism that is surrounding the gaming industry these days, and with the producers of GTA V being attacked for saying that masculinity was important to their story, I was more than a little surprised to see GTA V poking this particular bear.

Any thoughts? Was this irresponsible? Was it funny? Did you laugh? Do you think it's going to make people mad? Will feminist bloggers laugh it off, or consider it to be an attack?

More arguments are the only thing which will happen. Also Dan Houser had this to say about female leads

"We didn't really think about it this time. That's not to say that we couldn't or we wouldn't," Houser said. "This character set is just what came to us: it wasn't, 'we've got X and Y so we need Z,' we weren't trying to do it off a checklist--I don't think that will ever give you something that's believable or engaging."

"In the future, could we do a game with a lead female character? Of course," he added. "We just haven't found the right game for it yet, but it's one of the things that we always think about. It didn't feel natural for this game but definitely for the right game in the future--with the right themes, it could be fantastic. But for GTA V, this was the organic thing that came up, these were the characters what [sic] would display the themes we wanted to think about."

I think what houser said is perfectly fine but people will still attack him over it.

Rockstar makes fun of everyone. Nothing irresponsible about it. Is it always funny? No because their particular brand of satire is extremely dated at this point and has really lost its cleverness over the years. Stuff like this and Republican Space Rangers are both just examples of really obvious, easy humor. I find Rockstar's more absurd characters much funnier than any of this stuff.

But no, I don't think it's an attack or will it make people mad. It's not like this is a new thing.

This thread will go poorly.

Goddamn that writing. If it was anymore tongue-in-cheek, they'd rip their mouth open. Christ.

Sue Mury. Hah, summary. A+.

It's funny (probably more entertaining if I was driving around in-game with this in the background), it's not particularly special, and I'm sure it will offend someone as is often the case.

I don't think that radio station sounded like anything more than regular-ass half-hearted satire on feminism.

As for not having female characters, there's not really any way to answer that question safely. 'Course, bringing up the term "masculinity" is what kinda set things off, but I hardly think he meant anything bad by it. There's no way to explain the idea that men tend to have more angry, aggressive personalities without someone going "but women can be aggressive too!" Well, no shit, but that's a very tricky type of character to write. How do you put that down on paper? Do you just supplant Michael's lines, just switching the word "wife" with the word "husband", and apply them to a lady in her 40's? Would keeping the same conversation between Franklin and Lamar, only changing Franklin's sex, actually come across the same way and work just as well? If you have to change their lines in order for it to sound right, then doesn't it mean that there is something about being male that fits these characters?

God, I'm going to regret this post even though I mean absolutely nothing wrong by it.

it did make people mad. For example the gamespot one or polygon. They called it sexist and misogynistic

But I am asking. Why can you see penis in GTAV but no vagina? Talk about equality...

by itself? nah, stupid but who cares, but along with the strip club stuff, the lack of well written female characters in general (I haven't played it but I've heard that complaint plenty of times) it's worrying me.

I'm going to play it anyway but I can not like that part while liking the rest of the game, so don't even go there.

i don't think grand theft auto pushing the boundaries of good taste will offend anyone. it's grand-fucking-theft-auto. it practically exists just to piss everyone off. it's the south park equivalent of video games, so if it isn't pissing someone off, it isn't doing it's job. that doesn't make it successful, tasteful, or exceptionally well-made. it just is what it is- an adolescent power fantasy.

It is a story about male masculinity about male friendship and betrayal and every little bit be it the random events, the radio and TV shows are showing this.. There is no place for a main female protagonist. And there is nothing wrong with it. But hey what I am talking here you have not even played the game.....

no stop it

did I say protagonist? I did not say protagonist.

I said character, there is a difference; because you can be satirically anti black, but franklin (from what I saw in the QL & Vinny's live thing) was a pretty decent guy and thus mitigates most of the satirical racism.

Considering they've already made fun of just about everyone and everything on the right, and continue to do so in GTA V, I'm fine with it. But it's pretty obvious that they write these games from a more liberal, European point of view.

And for god's sake, please don't turn this into an argument. PLEASE. I know someone will (and I bet I know who) but I figured I'd ask anyway.

EDIT: While I was writing this post, the argument started. Thanks, @darji, for making sure the thread more quickly descended into an inane shouting match. You never fail at that, though.

whatever, they satirize everything. i don't wanna be that guy but i'm p. sure this is a flamebait thread

Darji,please....stop. Just....stop.

Michael is a decent guy as well. They are all not good people they stole they robbed they killed before and there is really no need for a good written female character. The only well written ones are the 3 main guys. Others are all cliche stereotypical and satirical and dumb. Most of this world is reflecting how these 3 feel and this is the brilliant writing because everything fits together.

I sometimes wonder how he has yet to be banned.

With how poorly written the skit is, i have a hard time believing their criticism is genuine.

Because we need people like him to point our fingers...something something...Scarface reference...goodnight to the bad guy...something something...rush rush get the yeyo?

Satire is always funny until you're the ones being satirized.

For the record I think it's completely fair game. Equality is what we're after, right?

Yeah. No problem with it, they skewer everybody.

I'm just having too much fun with the game to pay attention to it.

Yeah, keep telling yourself that. I'm sure some delusional republicans made the same excuse for GTA IV.

What part of my statement did you have a problem with exactly? That the skit is poorly written or that when Rockstar is making fun of something, they're always 100% genuine?

People preoccupied on the borderline of being obsessed with fighting any argument just for the sake of having the argument is what they seem to make fun of.

Anyone else click these threads just to watch the trainwreck continue?

I think the real issue here is that the satire on the radio stations just isn't funny. Rockstar's approach to satire seems to be "Here's this thing; let's exaggerate it then laugh at it". They very rarely having anything intelligent, pertinent or humorous to say about the stuff they're mocking. It's strange because I think some of the dialogue and other moments in the game can be genuinely funny.

I'm just saying that there is more than enough genuine criticism to go around for all political agendas.

I don't see how anyone would attack your post really. Well other than them feeling threatened by common sense i guess.

I think it's pretty hilarious. I've had it with all this PC shit in video games lately where developers(some of them) walk on egg shells to avoid getting scorned by games journalists.

GTA5 strays from that norm and takes it up to 11. I love it.

I'm about 5% in but I haven't laughed at a single joke.

I am in that same situation too. I recognize that something in the game as a joke but I don't find it particularly funny. This is part of the reason why people feel like GTA5 is stuck in the past when it comes to writing.

Well, I mean, we are on a public forum on the internet. Common sense doesn't often come into play.

It's pretty much the only reason I got to your comment.

So far I am really only laughing at the interactions between the main characters and the stuff in the side missions. I think I may have smiled at one thing on the radio, but most of that stuff seems like it was just plucked out of the last GTA game. I totally get why some people may still like it, but I agree with Jeff and other people here on the forums in that it seems a bit dated. They're doing such cool stuff with the narrative and characters, I wish some of the satire was less tired and more clever at this point.

I thought that the anti-feminism humor was funny in a "I can't believe they're doing this with the current climate of the gaming industry" sort of way, but I think the anti-gun stuff made me laugh the hardest so far, which is especially funny considering that I'm against most proposed limitations on firearms.

@spaceinsomniac: I hope the I get to stuff that is more clever at some point, maybe i just have poor luck so far. I certainly haven't heard or seen all of it and I want to experience it organically in the game. So far, the stuff I have heard hasn't even been all that memorable, I just know my laughs have been from the side characters and their interactions with the main characters and things that have happened in the main story. In fact, the funniest moment for me up to this point was the use of a song at a certain moment during a mission which caused an explosion of laughter from both my husband and I.

The game's writing is dated in that the Housers are still writing GTA games like it's 2001. Blunt social commentary and crass humor mixed with storylines heavily influenced by American pop culture. But what worked twelve years ago doesn't necessarily work as well now. Just ask Duke Nukem.

Point being, the Housers aren't as clever as they think they are, but their audience is too large for them to see any reason to change.

I think it's incredibly not funny or clever and therefore I find it offensive.

You can't laugh at them mocking one thing and then get pissy when they mock something else. Thats just stupid.

I didn't really laugh, but I think the content is fine and nothing to get riled up about. They are satirical about many different aspects of culture, always in a highly exaggerated and over the top way. It seems very in vogue at the moment to just get offended at everything that could be remotely considered sexist. It really doesn't do the cause any favours to be overly sensitive with everything, people from the outside just see people railing unjustly about something new every week. I'm not saying it doesn't exist and isn't something to speak out against, but just maybe pick something truly offensive and put things into perspective, maybe find something that is a little more prevalent or important than a bit of average satire, because it is out there, but this sort of stuff just makes feminists seem petty and hurts their image and other valid arguments.

I'm sorry, was that supposed to be clever? I'm offended (not really) that a game as seemingly well-written as GTA V still has try-hard satire with all the subtlety of an anvil, or perhaps a particularly bad episode of South Park.

Sexism? Oh right. All video game discussion is about sexism now. To answer that question, it's not offensive because it's lazy. There are probably questionable things in GTA V that might actually be worth beating the internet sexism drum over.

So misogynistic

Fernando is awesome. That is all.

Spray and Run

A great excuse for a sexist misogynist! How DARE he.. proper project? Anyone notice the disturbing lack of leading asian characters in videogames? Oh he's asian, he must be great at drifting! What a joke!

To each their own and I respect your opinions, but I think that's the beauty of Rockstar's humor, they know how to deliver obvious predictable tongue in cheek bullshit and still make it funny.

Maybe it's my love for GTA or the fact that I don't like to be too critical of comedy and just enjoy it, whether it's brilliant or cheap, as long as it's in the right spirit and makes me laugh, but I find Rockstar's obvious satire quite entertaining. It's a nice change from all the (good) humorous games that work hard, sometimes too hard, to create legitimately clever humor and steer clear from any obvious jokes.