Musai

People on tumblr need to stop blowing everything out of proportion. Rape culture is nonsense. There isn't rampant misogyny/sexism because female characters show skin. Anita is out of her mind. Developers and publisher won't pander to a minor demographic because they cry over spilled milk 24/7. If they do then they'll bankrupt the industry. After GDC it seem that they are geared to go that way.

I am ready to get banned, the hugbox has to be kept safe!

There's always gonna be assholes, nerd assholes happen to be the worst kind of assholes. They are the kind of assholes which are nearly always judgemental, stuck in their ways and that never understand real-life consequences of their actions.

A lot of people get understandably defensive in a lot of these conversations because the way the debate is presented is as if the video game community is somehow uniquely sexist, or uniquely unequal in some way in general. These problems run so much deeper than any of us are qualified to really diagnose, and it's incredibly shallow to just look at video games and pile on the shaming and blaming.

I think my biggest issue with this topic is that there's usually very little actual dialogue. You have the trolls who just try to disrupt the conversation for the lulz (we have our own very example right here in this thread!) or you have notable figures on YouTube or in the press who do little more than preach their sermons, and everyone not in those two groups kind of gets ignored. I can hardly blame the folks in the press for refusing to genuinely engage with their audience over the topic, though; they've completely won the influence war. The games press and most notables in a lot of social media is an echo chamber of feel-good progressivism. Why would they try to concede ground when they control the entire conversation? It's like a politician who's way ahead in the polls; they don't want to have a debate that could risk changing the narrative.

And like with politics, what happens when a group feels increasingly ignored? They grow increasingly bitter and desperate, and they get louder and louder, doing more and more to be noticed. There's your "toxicity." There's your "heat." What should be a mature conversation ends up looking like televangelists vs. 4chan.

Hell, none of this is meant to suggest that I don't totally sympathize and agree with where they're coming from. I'm as left-wing as all get-out, that's not the point. "Group C," as Brodehouse has termed them now apparently, has plenty of good points and their intentions are good. But I can't help but feel like there are upside down priorities at times.

I'm gay, and I'm poor. Guess which one gives me much more trouble on a day to day basis? (Spoiler: The latter.) I see social ills on a more complicated level than most in the press seem to. San Francisco is one of the most economically unequal cities in the nation. The games press would probably have a more direct and positive impact on their community by helping out a homeless dude and campaigning for affordable housing than they would by complaining about the alleged misogyny in GTA V.

It really makes me wonder why people dislike Patrick so much. Do articles like his challenge their views on video games? Are they afraid of some change? Jeff and Ryan, two guys that people in these hate groups actually respect a lot, would be the first to tell people that hate Patrick and the kind of stuff he writes to fuck off. Jeff is like the most video-games-gamesman ever and he supports what Patrick does. I remember Jeff talking about it on a Jar Time or something.

@random45 said:

This is basically how I reacted to FemFreq's analysis of Spelunky, a game in which you can not only play as a male or female character (from the start!), but you can make the damsels male, female, or even non-human if neither gender choice is your thing. Aside from the abstract concept of the "damsel" and its history as being traditionally a female role, I think there is almost literally nothing that you can find in Spelunky to complain about. It seemed like a pretty poorly-chosen example.

I am so, so tired of every games site I look at having articles and discussion about this stuff every day. That's not saying I don't believe it's an issue but come on, it's gotten god damn ridiculous.

Welp, this thread has already gone places.

I think the problem is in the delivery rather than the content. It's the condescending, self-righteous attitude that has reared its head in the games press recently that rubs people the wrong way.... though there are also plenty of jerks who seemingly hate women or take any accusation of sexism as a call for censorship. It's the internet man. I know that's a reductive statement, but I'm not a sociologist.