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Excuse Me While I Dismantle Thunderf00t’s Anti-Sarkeesian Video With One Screenshot

July 12

Some YouTuber named Thunderf00t has a problem with Anita Sarkeesian. You can be forgiven if you don’t know who she is. She’s a feminist YouTuber who had the audacity to create a series of videos on anti-feminist tropes in video games. I respect her work. In a world in which most people don’t take video games seriously, she not only takes them seriously but turns a critical eye toward them, which is what is required to improve art. This guy, Thunderf00t, hates Anita, her gaming-oriented mission, and feminism.

Three weeks ago Anita Sarkeesian released the latest video, Women As Background Decoration, in her series, Tropes vs. Women In Video Games. You can probably guess from its title, but her video dealt with the way women are often treated as sexual wallpaper in videogames. It was a half-hour video that featured examples from dozens of games, and we highlighted it in YouTube Nation. I highly recommend it.

Thunderf00t does not recommend it. In fact, he released yet another video, yesterday,accusing Sarkeesian of cherry-picking content from video games and distorting it to prove her point — never mind that you can’t cherry pick anything when there are no cherries.

This times, Thunderf00t suggests that Sarkeesian is playing fast and loose the game, Hitman, featured briefly in her video. Sarkeesian spent a fleeting moment discussing a mission in Hitman that brought characters through a strip club changing room, where they could behave violently toward the strippers. This was part of a larger discussion on the multitude of games that include strip clubs and allow you to behave violently toward women as sex objects, but Thunderf00t ignores that. Instead he rebuts that the game penalizes you for attacking innocent people, so most gamers would never attack the strippers the way Sarkeesian illustrated, and consequently, Sarkeesian is a feminist liar who can’t be trusted. Seriously, that’s all it comes down to.

His argument is absolutely ridiculous. Whether doing a speedrun in Super Mario Brothers or randomly mowing down innocent bystanders in GTA, the beauty of video gaming is that you are never really required to play the game as designed. In fact, in the post-GTA-3, open-world era of gaming, you are invited to play however you want. To that end, allow me to present the rubuttal to Thunderf00t in an image it took me all of one minute to find. Hint: My search was Hitman game strippers. Needless to say, I didn’t search long.

one image

 

So let’s go through this item-by-item. First, this is a video that illustrates a couple of gamers playing the game in a way not necessarily intended. They are simply killing strippers and manhandling them. Hence the title, “Fun With Strippers.” This video’s mere existence already undermine’s Thunderf00t’s argument.

Let’s go to the sidebar. Here we quickly come across seven other videos that speak to Sarkeesian’s point about the sexual objectification of women in games. When you’re done with “Fun With Strippers,” maybe you’d like to hop over to “Stripper Challenge?” Spoiler alert: In this video of a challenge hidden in the game, a stripper dances sexually in a window before the gamer decides to kill her, despite the penalty he’ll be assessed.

Let’s hop into the comments. The comments are a wealth of fun. Brandon Dodd celebrates with the comment “Yea Dead Hookers.” Another says “Lol a perfect murder! Strangle a stranger dancing in the middle of a crowd :-)” When someone attempts to suggest that Squee505, the creator of this video, is playing the game a way that is antithetical to the game developers’ intent, Squee responds that he doesn’t “get” Hitman, which has always been about “mass-murdering.”

The comments actually speak to Sarkeesian’s other point in the video that the people who are most inclined to argue against the effects of mass media are the ones most likely to be affected by it. That isn’t a suggestion that people who love video games like this are going to go out and start killing strippers. Never. It’s that there are those people who will accept this as what normal entertainment is and should be.

It doesn’t matter that you don’t have to kill strippers in Hitman. It matters that you can, and that’s what Thunderf00t seems to be unable to understand.

  • jmaynardg

    Earnest,

    There’s a greater point here I think you’re missing. In focusing on the details of Sarkeesian’s critique of Hitman, you point out that Thunderf00t had taken her words out of context in his criticism. And that Sarkeesian had used numerous other examples to bolster her argument that he ignored. Fine enough. It’s on-topic to the debate. Which would be meaningful if Thunderf00t, and the community who support him in mob action, are engaged in critical debate and not apparent slander with intent to defame character against Sarkeesian.

    You can’t debate someone who refuses to play by the rules. And I think it’s fair to say that someone with a Ph.D in chemistry, as Thunderf00t reportedly has, ought to know the rules of academic discourse.

    Look at his claims in this and prior videos he’s disseminated. In this video, he claims Sarkeesian is lying. Not in error, not mistaken, not confused – but a liar. In prior videos he – and others on Youtube – have claimed that Sarkeesian is academically dishonest. They have claimed plagiarism with sources. Fraud, with her financial backing via Kickstarter. And they have done this without any evidence on the public record. No convictions for fraud, or even an arrest. No academic review panel convened, much less a stripping of her credentials. No evidence of intent to disseminate false statements for personal gain – lies – whatsoever.

    This is not criticism. It’s an organized smear campaign.

    I would call Thunderf00t’s approach demagoguery. A modern day Father Coughlin of Youtube. Wrapping himself in the cloak of ‘libertarian rationalism’, he eschews hate through a platform with tens of thousands of Youtube followers and hundreds of thousands of views per video. He has a large audience. And therefore, it appears to my lay legal perspective, that this work disseminates defamatory speech with intent to harm Sarkeesian’s reputation and good standing.

    I don’t say this to squelch legitimate criticism of Sarkeesian’s videos. I’m not crazy about her analytic process. I do think there’s plenty of room to challenge her on point. And believe that such critiques would benefit general discourse.

    But Thunderf00t isn’t doing that. And it should be pointed out.

    • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

      You know what? You’re absolutely correct. It isn’t a discussion or argument this group is in search of. Instead, it’s Sarkeesian’s head on a platter they want.

      • NotAHotBassPlayer

        You are quite adamant of protecting your waifu, are you not?

        • http://www.facebook.com/people/Jane-Snape/100001971991197 Jane Snape

          Spoken like someone who can’t handle the give-and-take involved in real-world relationships with real persons.

      • http://www.facebook.com/people/Jane-Snape/100001971991197 Jane Snape

        Oh, of course. Especially since they think she showed weakness by going to the cops over this. These clowns are like ISIS: They act all tough and bully-boy when they think they’re safe or outnumber their targets, but when their targets fight back they run like the cowards they are.

    • NotAHotBassPlayer

      That was an impressive wall of text of absolutely nothing. You’re just rambling about how some faggot named Thunderf00t hasn’t received the green light from the federal government to dispute Sarkeesian. Like really, what was the bloody point of that nonsense?

    • Aerensiniac

      “Thunderf00t had taken her words out of context in his criticism”
      Great argument, now then lease tell us what the full context is.
      Im asking because i have watched the said video, and said sentence is about as out of context as a drop of salt water can be in the ocean.
      Maybe you have seen something else than i did, so please proceed with the elaboration of your argument and dont just stop with the claim, otherwise you are making the very same bs argument you are accusing thunderf00t with: a smear campaign.

      And in regards of “others on Youtube – have claimed that Sarkeesian is […]” most of the claims were proven to be true.
      – She is academically dishonest because in almost every point she makes she is using double standards as broad as our current material universe itself.
      – She did plagiarism with other people’s youtube videos.
      – Fraud because she lied about her standpoint from the get go and still nobody knows what she used the kickstarter money for.
      And they have done this with evidence over and over presented in many videos.

      I fear you have something wrong here bob.
      “See no evil, hear no evil, say no evil” does not mean that there is no evil in the world.
      Similarly, if you cover your eyes and ears from evidence about how much a shit stain Anita is, it doesnt mean that evidence does not exist.
      Do you want me to make a list for you, or can you use google search all yourself?

      • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

        Hi, sorry I missed this comment when you left it. If you’ve watched Sarkeesian’s video, you would recognize that Thunderf00t casually forgot to include the beginning of her comments which make clear that she is not referring specifically to Hitman but to a whole range of games including Hitman.

        Regarding your bullet points. I’m not sure that I get what you mean by the first one. I do not see any plagiarism in her video. If you mean her use of someone else’s video within her own, that use is what is known in our copyright law as “fair use,” using someone else’s content to illustrate a point is protected by law. With regard to the Kickstarter money, she only asked for a small amount and received a large amount. What she did with all the money she received is really beside the point as long as she used the amount she asked for to do the thing she promised, which she has.

        • Aerensiniac

          “””Thunderf00t casually forgot to include the beginning of her comments
          which make clear that she is not referring specifically to Hitman but to
          a whole range of games including Hitman.”””
          That does not resolve the original problem with her statement. She bought up hitman as an example for the similar other “whole range of games”.
          In her opinion Hitman encourages and/or promotes violence against “females”, which is greatly problematical due to two separate issues:
          1. Hitman does not encourage you to assault females (or any other civilians for the same matter). In fact, the game penalizes you for killing them.
          How this is interpreted as encouragement to kill/abuse/harm, is beyond every sane person’s guess, and if this is the best example for a “whole range” of other games, then her stand point is even less recoverable.
          2. Just in order to make her point about female abuse, she ignores the hundreds of male characters she butchered to wind up at her example scene. Because you know… this is all about abusing females.

          “”” I do not see any plagiarism in her video.””””
          Not in this video (at least i hope). She got under fire for a couple of her earlier videos where she would take other peoples footages without asking.
          In regards of fair use, im no lawyer, but im pretty sure that you cant stack it. A game footage with commentary is fair use. Using that video and removing the audio or otherwise cutting it… thats kinda problematical. The context is shifted.

          “””What she did with all the money she received is really beside the point
          as long as she used the amount she asked for to do the thing she
          promised, which she has.”””
          She has made promises and requested money to fulfil them. Had she not done it in such manner, nobody would give a damn.

          • http://pettie.us Earnest

            Thanks for responding so quickly. I will do you the same courtesy.

            1) Her problem isn’t specifically that it promotes violence against females. In fact, she has no problem with video game violence. Her specific issue was that women were being portrayed in an exclusively sexualized manner and existed solely to be gawked at and, ultimately, abused. She makes clear that the mechanics are not mandatory and goes on to illustrate how they are encouraged. It’s the exact same thing as the first level of Super Mario Bros. being designed to teach you how to play the game. You can’t go to the left, you must go right. If you don’t jump over the Koopa, you will die. If you jump over the koopa, you are likely going to hit a brick or the question mark. If you do the former, you will either avoid the mushroom or touch it. If you touch it, you’ll learn that hidden objects can have an effect on your character. It’s all there in the design, and so it is with these games as well. I feel like she couldn’t be any clearer on the matter: http://youtu.be/4ZPSrwedvsg?t=21m26s
            1b) Again, her point isn’t abuse or violence. It is explicit in the title of the video that she is discussing women as background dressing, and, in this subsection, how those objectified women are designed to be expendable. I feel like this may be a stumbling block that many people are running into. This is not a video about video game violence. It is not even a video about violence toward women. It is about a trope that exists within video games. And again, even if it were about abusing women, the point would remain that the range of male characters you run into is much wider than the range of female characters, which is what she’s ultimately getting at.

            2) Again, it is absolutely acceptable to use other people’s footage without asking, as long as it is used in a way consistent with Fair Use. Removing the audio or cutting the footage is still an acceptable means of fair use. Especially given that the product she is creating is for educational purposes.

            3) Here are her goals:

            With your help, I’ll produce a 5-video series (now expanded to 12 videos) entitled Tropes vs Women in Video Games, exploring female character stereotypes throughout the history of the gaming industry. This ambitious project will primarily focus on these reoccurring tropes:

            Damsel in Distress – Video #1
            The Fighting F#@k Toy – Video #2
            The Sexy Sidekick – Video #3
            The Sexy Villainess – Video #4
            Background Decoration – Video #5

            1st Set of Stretch Goals Achieved!

            Voodoo Priestess/Tribal Sorceress – Video #6
            Women as Reward – Video #7
            Mrs. Male Character – Video #8
            Unattractive Equals Evil – Video #9
            Man with Boobs – Video #10
            Positive Female Characters! – Video #11

            2nd Stretch Goal Achieved!

            Let’s Bump up the Production Quality!

            3rd Set of Stretch Goals Achieved!

            Tropes vs Women in Video Games Classroom Curriculum
            Video #12 – Top 10 Most Common Defenses of Sexism in Games

            Each video will be between 10 and 20 minutes long and available online for free for everyone and anyone to watch, share and use.

            It appears to me that she is making the videos she set out to make and is thus delivering on her promise. If you could please point out where she is not delivering on the promise, it would be helpful.

            Let me ask you this. Do you disagree with her thesis that women are often included in video games in a highly sexualized way, designed to be little more than eye candy?

          • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

            Thanks for responding so quickly. I will do you the same courtesy.

            1) Her problem isn’t specifically that it promotes violence against females. In fact, she has no problem with video game violence. Her specific issue was that women were being portrayed in an exclusively sexualized manner and existed solely to be gawked at and, ultimately, abused. She makes clear that the mechanics are not mandatory and goes on to illustrate how they are encouraged. It’s the exact same thing as the first level of Super Mario Bros. being designed to teach you how to play the game. You can’t go to the left, you must go right. If you don’t jump over the Koopa, you will die. If you jump over the koopa, you are likely going to hit a brick or the question mark. If you do the former, you will either avoid the mushroom or touch it. If you touch it, you’ll learn that hidden objects can have an effect on your character. It’s all there in the design, and so it is with these games as well. I feel like she couldn’t be any clearer on the matter: http://youtu.be/4ZPSrwedvsg?t=21m26s
            1b) Again, her point isn’t abuse or violence. It is explicit in the title of the video that she is discussing women as background dressing, and, in this subsection, how those objectified women are designed to be expendable. I feel like this may be a stumbling block that many people are running into. This is not a video about video game violence. It is not even a video about violence toward women. It is about a trope that exists within video games. And again, even if it were about abusing women, the point would remain that the range of male characters you run into is much wider than the range of female characters, which is what she’s ultimately getting at.

            2) Again, it is absolutely acceptable to use other people’s footage without asking, as long as it is used in a way consistent with Fair Use. Removing the audio or cutting the footage is still an acceptable means of fair use. Especially given that the product she is creating is for educational purposes.

            3) Here are her goals:

            With your help, I’ll produce a 5-video series (now expanded to 12 videos) entitled Tropes vs Women in Video Games, exploring female character stereotypes throughout the history of the gaming industry. This ambitious project will primarily focus on these reoccurring tropes:

            Damsel in Distress – Video #1
            The Fighting F#@k Toy – Video #2
            The Sexy Sidekick – Video #3
            The Sexy Villainess – Video #4
            Background Decoration – Video #5

            1st Set of Stretch Goals Achieved!

            Voodoo Priestess/Tribal Sorceress – Video #6
            Women as Reward – Video #7
            Mrs. Male Character – Video #8
            Unattractive Equals Evil – Video #9
            Man with Boobs – Video #10
            Positive Female Characters! – Video #11

            2nd Stretch Goal Achieved!

            Let’s Bump up the Production Quality!

            3rd Set of Stretch Goals Achieved!

            Tropes vs Women in Video Games Classroom Curriculum
            Video #12 – Top 10 Most Common Defenses of Sexism in Games

            Each video will be between 10 and 20 minutes long and available online for free for everyone and anyone to watch, share and use.

            It appears to me that she is making the videos she set out to make and is thus delivering on her promise. If you could please point out where she is not delivering on the promise, it would be helpful.

            Let me ask you this. Do you disagree with her thesis that women are often included in video games in a highly sexualized way, designed to be little more than eye candy?

          • Aerensiniac

            “””Her specific issue was that women were being portrayed in an exclusively
            sexualized manner and existed solely to be gawked at and, ultimately,
            abused”””
            Yes. The problem is that this concept is wrong on a hundred different levels.
            The game didnt portray women in an EXCLUSIVELY sexualized manner since the strip club was but one single part of the mission, the map, the game. Most female npcs inside the game were portrayed as your everyday average citizen.
            In this shape and form, her argument is reduced to “how dare you suggest that there are strip clubs. Thats sexist.”. At which point you have completely lost me, because strippers exist. This is not something the developers came up with to display every female on the planet as a slave to males, this was a piece of our current reality.
            I really fail to understand the problem.

            “””She makes clear that the mechanics are not mandatory and goes on to illustrate how they are encouraged.”””

            This is another argument which blew my engine cover.
            The game penalizes you for doing what she did in her video.
            Past this point her argument is like “zomg supermario encourages suicide attempts, because you can jump down into a hole, and this ofc encourages reality.”
            …………….what?
            Im sorry, but seriously… what?
            You are doing something in a game that (strictly speaking) goes against the rules. The game penalizes you for it (whether its a mission failed, life lost, negative score or whatever it does not matter. There is a penalty for your actions). In this situation to make the claim that it encourages you to do so is just clinically insane… Its an evergreen forest of demagogy drawn in 7 colours of sophism.
            Its like using a NES cartridge as a throwing disc and then suing the manufacturer because you threw your lil brother’s eye out with it.
            “Well it was a slightly thin physical object. It clearly encouraged me to throw it around. The manufacturer is an inhumane piece of shit”.
            Once again i dont get it. How is this even an argument?

            “””It is about a trope that exists within video games”””
            And this is the core statement, yes. Its something that is idiotic on a hundred million different levels, but we could spend days arguing about it. In a nutshell: The argument cherry picks scenes from games and twists them out to make a completely demagogue point.
            In hitman’s example: The great majority of the npcs you will be killing and abusing are males, BUT this does not keep Anita from making the point that the game promotes these “tropes”.
            The entire argument is a biased double standard, and allow me to link you a video that elaborates this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJeX6F-Q63I&list=UUmb8hO2ilV9vRa8cilis88A

            In regards of 2 and 3: Im skipping the argument.
            You do not see an issue, i do. The way everything went down is questionable at best, starting from the moment she attempted to sell herself as a professional gamer, just to turn out as someone who summarizes gaming as “ripping other people’s heads off”.

          • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

            Your failure to understand the problem IS the problem. It is an unwillingness to step outside your understanding of the world and attempt to see it from another side that limits you from even accepting even the more basic premises that you’d be smart to do.

            There are things that EVERYONE would agree on. There is no one in their right mind who would argue that women have not been treated as eye candy and window dressing in games. Heck, in pinball machines, that is literally what women were used for. Our society has been sexist, so it is natural that gaming, which exists within that society, would be too. It doesn’t even make you a bad person to enjoy the fruits of that. I’m not above a little titillation in my games! It’s just good to be aware of it and be aware of the impact it may have on some people, for better or for worse.

            But let’s go on to the point about the game mechanics, because I thought it was quite clear. It DOESN’T MATTER that there is a penalty for the behavior. It matters that you have to execute the behavior to learn there is a penalty for it. A good game designer builds his or her games so that you learn the rules of the game by playing. Thus, they are inviting you to do the things that bring penalties because that’s how you learn they are penalties. You learn Koopas can kill you by letting one touch you. Eventually, you learn that there is an incentive to stomp the koopa. That’s how game design works.

            Thank you for not arguing points 2 and 3, which, come on, we both know I’m essentially right on. We both can see that she is delivering exactly what she asked for the money to create, and the videos she’s creating fall squarely within the confines of fair use.

            If you can’t accept, though, that maybe women are treated differently from men in games, that in Hitman, the VERY FIRST WOMAN YOU ENCOUNTER is naked and showering, which is a choice made by the game dev, then 1) I feel sorry for you and 2) this argument is pointless.

          • Aerensiniac

            “””There are things that EVERYONE would agree on. There is no one in their
            right mind who would argue that women have not been treated as eye candy
            and window dressing in games. Heck, in pinball machines, that is
            literally what women were used for. Our society has been sexist[…]”
            I do not deny sexism. I ask of you what is wrong with it.
            Our species has a significant sexual drive and opposing genders are attracted (mostly) to each other.
            The underlying theme i disagree with here is that as a male you cant have or want to have sex without objectifying and/or dominating your partner, and that this should be something fundamentally wrong.
            Bullshit.
            Im male, im attracted to females. That does not mean that im viewing them as objects or some sort of “f*** toys”.
            Explain to me why sexism automatically means objectification and stripping females (or males) from their human being.
            Im aware of sexism, yet i question the feminist claims around it. Thats my point.
            Sexual attraction does not objectify anything or anyone. Thats the delusion of someone who went through some sort of traumatic relationship with an asshole as a partner. Yet to extrapolate this onto all males and the entire society, is just a sweeping generalization, bias and idiocy.

            “But let’s go on to the point about the game mechanics, because I thought
            it was quite clear. It DOESN’T MATTER that there is a penalty for the
            behavior. It matters that you have to execute the behavior to learn
            there is a penalty for it.”
            Aaaand you made a mistake there.
            Following your argument, the game did not encourage you to execute said behaviour. YOU wanted to try it, and you just happened to find out afterwards that you are/are not penalized for said action.
            Its literally like wanting to do something dirty and then feeling bad about it afterwards, blaming the content creators for allowing you to make a choice.
            Just like in Hitman’s example. For the argument’s sake, lets even ignore the fact that this area was in
            the third mission, WAY AFTER the game has already taught you that
            killing innocents is penalized.
            Anita happens to find 2 female stripper NPCs and goes on to beat them up and kill them. Please explain to me how in the living hell does this validate the claim that she was encouraged to do it just because it was possible to do it.
            This is probably the most desperate type of reasoning i have seen in a while, and just to spell it out: The encouragement was inside her head. Not inside the game. She probably should seek psychological help.

            “If you can’t accept, though, that maybe women are treated differently
            from men in games, that in Hitman, the VERY FIRST WOMAN YOU ENCOUNTER is
            naked and showering, which is a choice made by the game dev, then 1) I
            feel sorry for you and 2) this argument is pointless.”
            If you feel that this argument is pointless im sorry. Though i do feel a bit similar, because listening to people go on about a naked showering girl while they killed 20 males to get up to that point has a slight irony to it.
            Especially considering that one guy phoning next to a window, just learning that he does not have cancer, just be thrown out the window a second later and falling to its death.
            But hey. We live in a society where seeing a naked woman is more offending than having a good laugh at a man falling to its death 1 second after he learned that he does not have cancer.
            A pointless argument? Possible, but as you said: “It’s just good to be aware of it and be aware of the impact it may have on some people”

            P.S.: I do agree with you that in hitman, females should have been equalized more, as for example, making them guards, combatants, whatever. Yet if the designers did that, then Anita would be making her video about how outrageous it is that there are female guards and that you can kill them.
            Why? Because feminism is about nothing more that constantly and non-stop victimizing yourself.
            Its the very reason why having any type of communication with a feminist is so tiresome, because in everything they see their own oppression and enslavement by the patriarchy.
            I miss the feminism of the old days where it was about simple rational arguments like wanting equal rights and wages. (Which notion i support btw). Today’s feminazis are just clinically insane psychopaths.

          • http://www.facebook.com/people/Jane-Snape/100001971991197 Jane Snape

            Aeresiniac’s being a silly troll who is using cut-and-paste talking points he’s picked up from right-wing gynophobes like Blunderf00t. The whole “quoting from my own words and videos to prove me wrong is violation of my copyright!” crapola is a common trick used by wingnuts to stifle criticism.

          • Graeme Evans

            I didnt know the definition of troll had been extended to include rational people who completele dismante and refute the rambling nonsense of idiots

          • Aerensiniac

            Welcome to feminism…

          • Aerensiniac

            Isnt it quite an irony than even with cut and paste points i have created more of an argument than you did with your “lol troll” ad hominem…?

            If you want to make an argument, do it. If not… you know the deal.

    • http://www.facebook.com/people/Jane-Snape/100001971991197 Jane Snape

      JMaynardG, this is not the first time Blunderf00t’s shot himself in the foot with his video garbage. When George Takei publicized the Solar Roadways project, he went berzerk with a similarly-bad video attacking the SR concept – one that the SR folks debunked as neatly as Mr. Pettie debunked his attack on Ms. Sarkeesian:
      http://solarroadways.com/clearingthefreakinair.shtml

      By the way, Solar Roadways is gearing up to do projects for NASA and Amtrak, among others. Here’s a post on their involvement in renovating an Amtrak depot in Sandpoint, Idaho: http://my.firedoglake.com/phoenix/2014/08/31/solar-roadways-the-amtrak-commission-and-other-news/

  • Freddy

    “It doesn’t matter that you don’t have to kill strippers in Hitman. It matters that you can, and that’s what Thunderf00t seems to be unable to understand.”

    How does it matter that you can kill strippers? You can kill the bouncers, bartenders, patrons… any human in the hitman game can be killed, it has nothing to do with gender or occupation.

    This reminds me a little bit of the other Sarkeesian argument about hookers in GTA series. She pointed out that women (all of them,obviously) are objectified by the game due to the fact that the player can pay for a hooker and her “services” will heal him / give him a reward. And that’s bad,and apparently all the hookers in real life doing their job exist because life imitates art, not the other way around.

    Also judging from that guy Squee505’s comment about what hitman is all about, yea quite obviously a troll. But you go ahead and use it to prove whatever you want.

    • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

      One of the first things I learned in film school is that everything you see on screen is the result of a choice, and learning to appreciate film is learning to appreciate those choices. The same is true for video games. Every element of the game is the result of someone making a choice. Having a strip club mission is a choice, having an element of that mission that takes you near the dressing area is a choice, and having that area accessible is also a choice. So it becomes a question of why do so many people developers make this choice? That’s the thing that I think many people are failing to understand. Her video wasn’t about Hitman– it was about a wealth of games all making this same choice. How many of the bouncers are women? How many of the bartenders? How many of the patrons? It’s about women being reduced to specific roles in many games– not just Hitman.

      Sarkeesian’s broader point across all her videos isn’t usually that it’s bad that these things exist. It’s usually that it’s bad that these things exist without other things to balance them out.

      What makes Squee’s comment an “obvious” troll? I’ve been a troll and I’ve dealt with trolls for years, and this just seems to be a sincere expression of his perspective on the game.

      • Jeff Chang

        “One of the first things I learned in film school is that everything you see on screen is the result of a choice, and learning to appreciate film is learning to appreciate those choices.”

        Yes, it is TRULY HORRIBLE that a video game about the underbelly of Chicago has a Strip Club in it.

        I was actually hoping for a genders studies course followed by a Economics course (teaching neo-Keynesian theories; of course) and the hitman, posing as a student, would have to assassinate a Men’s Right Movement speaker, followed up by Thomas Sowell (for being an EVIL capitalist)

        ” Her video wasn’t about Hitman– it was about a wealth of games all making this same choice.”

        Deflection.

        “How many of the bouncers are women?”

        How many female bouncers are there in real life? What are the ratios?

        “How many of the bartenders?”

        Why? So would could spew more BS about the strip club having female bartenders and strippers.

        “How many of the patrons?”

        I forgot it was lesbian ladies night at a strip club. Hey, as a queer person of color I find it offensive that I get weird looks when I grab a drink at a gay club on ladies night. It’s almost as if the lesbian females don’t like having men at a specific female event.

        “Sarkeesian’s broader point across all her videos isn’t usually that it’s bad that these things exist. It’s usually that it’s bad that these things exist without other things to balance them out.”

        Other than the numerous strong females in Hitman, MGS series, Bayonetta, etc etc etc.

      • Graeme Evans

        how many female patrons are there in the strip club? Have you ever been to a strip club? most guys don’t know how to take their girl to a strip club, which is why the patrons are 99.9% guys

        i’m not even going to justify the rest of your nonsense with a response.

        • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

          Actually, I’ve been to them several times, and there have always been female customers, often there with their significant others. Have you been to a strip club?

          • Gregg Braddoch

            “I’ve been to them several times, and there have always been female customers, often there with their significant others.”

            Yet somehow it is “sexist” to have a strip club in a video game, and female strippers. It’s ok for you to go to a strip club and watch women dance for you in the nude for money, but it’s NOT ok to have a virtual strip club where a game story takes place, simply because there are “not enough” female patrons or bartenders. LMFAO. That is some of the best mental gymnastics ever, and not even close to the argument that Sarkeesian makes.

          • Sylveria Shini

            Sounds like your a misogynistic pig exploiting women to me. Now you’re desperately looking for some method to publicly apologize for your internalize hatred of women. But, instead of admitting you’re a misogynistic pig, you’re choosing to project that on to everyone else. Not all men are scumfucks like you, sir. Probably why Hitman sales were lackluster, not all gamers want to kill strippers or watch other people kill strippers as much as you seemingly do.

  • Naku

    You are missing the point of Thunderf00ts criticism. And if Sarkeesians argument is ”There are strippers in this game, which you can kill, thus sexism” she is even more of an idiot than I thought. (And frankly, so are the people who agree with her on this.) Like mentioned, what about all the other men you can kill? Is that sexism too? Doesn’t that promote misandry? Why is killing scantily clothed women sexism, but killing scantily clothed men perfectly fine?

    It’s this type of double standard why modern feminism annoys me, they are not interested in equality, but in empowerment of women, at the expense of men.

    I do agree that women are generally under represented in games, but that has more to with target audience than sexism. Improvement can always be made though.

    • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

      It comes back to representation. Are you able to kill scantily clad men in anywhere near the same numbers as women? What about the other way? Do you usually have as many fully-clothed women to kill as men? At what expense would being able to kill fully clothed women with different careers in a video game come? The cost of a few male NPC’s? Is anyone really going to complain about that?

      Yes, being able to kill primarily men in a variety of different roles is sexist. It’s a type of sexism that assumes only males fill those roles or will be believable in those roles. It effects both men and women.

      • Jeff Chang

        “Are you able to kill scantily clad men in anywhere near the same numbers as women? ”

        Yes, you BS artist.

        You can kill barely dress men. The pool boy in Blood Money and the WMD Scientist in Contracts.

        “Do you usually have as many fully-clothed women to kill as men?”

        Yes. The Casino in Blood money has a fair mix. of males and females.

        “Yes, being able to kill primarily men in a variety of different roles is sexist. It’s a type of sexism that assumes only males fill those roles or will be believable in those roles.”

        Given the genre of the game centers around crime lords, terrorists, and other scum one only has to look at the REAL criminal syndicates to garner where the representations of in-game gender dynamics come from.

        But I will give you a couple strong women in Hitman.

        The female assassin in Hitman Blood Money
        Diana in ALL Hitman missions that sacrifices herself to protect an innocent teen.
        The daughter of the gun shop owner in Hitman Absolution that can outshoot most of the males there.

        P.S. You are on my Progressive Bullshitters list (I have a religious and conservative one too.) I will take pleasure in criticizing every BS post that you make.

        Have a good night, shit weasel.

        • http://www.facebook.com/people/Jane-Snape/100001971991197 Jane Snape

          Awww, poor MRA twit with craptastic reading comprehension and no actual girlfriends.

          • Aerensiniac

            Ad hominem. The peak of intellect and the most rational argument out there.
            Boy you showed him.

        • John

          >> Yes, you BS artist.

          He is just a well intentioned person who has been hoodwinked.

          Anita and people like her – the wanna be leaders – they are the BS artists.

      • Graeme Evans

        how many men do you kill compared to women? are you seriously asking that? Do you not play video games? You’re honestly going to try and twist that to say there should be more women in games to show different careers? You’ll try and twist anything won’t you.

  • NotAHotBassPlayer

    I seriously hope you’re done embarrassing yourself now, Earnest. I swear if I cringed any harder reading this, my sphincter would be able to turn coal into diamonds. But do yourself a favor and keep your monumental retardation to yourself.

    • http://www.facebook.com/people/Jane-Snape/100001971991197 Jane Snape

      Oooh, this must have given your bros big wood over at the He-Man Woman Hater’s Club! Did they give you wet sloppy kisses for it?

  • Aerensiniac

    >>Excuse Me While I Dismantle Thunderf00t’s Anti-Sarkeesian Video With One Screenshot

    Excuse Me While I Dismantle Earnest Pettie’s Anti-Thunderf00t Video With One sentence:
    Call back once you have actually answered a couple of arguments raised by Thunderf00t.
    Thanks in advance.

    And just for the sake of pointing out a newborn star of stupidity on the sky:

    “the beauty of video gaming is that you are never really required to play the game as designed”

    Take a moment and think a bit about what the actual hell you have written down here, because i haven’t got the slightest frikin idea.
    Are you really trying to make the argument here that the beauty of gaming is that you can lose it because you are a dumbfuck? Cause thats really all i can see here with your implication that being penalized to kingdom come by assaulting bystanders in hitman absolution is the “beauty” of it.

    You have triggered bs warning the moment you wrote in the first few sentences of your blog that you are respecting Anita’s work and that people can be forgive if they do not know who she is, but i thought i would give it a shot and see what arguments you line up in defense of her.
    Turns out, you have dragged out one single sentence of Thunderf00t’s video where he claims he has not found any lets plays where ppl would be beating up the strip dancers and are gloating that you have.
    Good job for someone with the mental capacity of an 8 year old.
    Please tell us once you have actually grown up to the point where you can actually formulate arguments that make sense, and/or reached the mental fortitude to react on arguments.
    Till then, please go back to school, or the tumblr hell where females with your type of blessed intellect stand in lines.

    • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

      >>Are you really trying to make the argument here that the beauty of gaming is that you can lose it because you are a dumbfuck?

      Actually, the beauty is that you can lose it because you can do whatever you want in it. That’s what sets it apart from other storytelling media.

      • Aerensiniac

        The argument is twisted beyond recovery. A certain level of freedom of choice does not encourage anything. If the world would work like that there would be anarchy and nothing else.

        • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

          Perhaps. However, if one were to believe in a creator for the world, one would then be able to presume that the creator intended for us to see what we could do in the world. We’d test the limits, right?

          • Aerensiniac

            Im not the creator of the world so i can hardly tell what the/a creator’s (if it/any exist) intentions are.
            What i can say however is that the “see the limits” concept erases all difference between yes and no, erases all moral standards, laws and/or norms.

            Arguing that just because you have the possibility to do something you are automatically challenged to do it, cause you need to see the limits…. i cant follow up on that, simply because then everything and literally everything goes.

            Its incomprehensible.
            Just because you could do something you should not feel encouraged to do so as long you have a healthy mind.
            In example you could walk out your door right now and stab 3 people in the heart. Its a possibility, but unless you are frikin insane you should feel absolutely no encouragement from the mere possibility of it.

            And finally yes: You could argue that a game is different from reality, but the same principle of action and reaction remains. If you feel challenged or encouraged simply from a possibility, then you are probably insane, and Anita (or her argument) walks the fence pretty hard with this idiotic idea.

          • http://mellifluent.info earnestp
          • Aerensiniac

            I have read through that and havent seen anything other than a massive strawman. No offense.
            To begin with, the example you keep on dragging up is one of problem solving. You might be encouraged to tackle a problem from different perspectives, yes, but sadly in Anita’s example, THERE IS NO PROBLEM.
            We have Anita walking through a room without an objective in there and starts to randomly beat up two NPCs completely unrelated to the goal, the problem, the objective. Hell, in fact its an action that is penalized, ergo it does not help her resolve the objective, it hinders her.

            If you honestly want to tell me that its a choice to fuck yourself or your game play up and in fact you are encouraged to do so, then lets quit talking to each other at this point because you are Anita’s type of “special” person, who seemingly feels an encouragement to play super mario’s first 1 second over and over again, and run straight into the first goomba which appears, just for the sake of a completely fucked up and twisted argument that the game is oppressing certain people, skin coulours, genders, gods, animals and the flying spaghetti monster.

          • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

            I’ve decided to copy and paste my response to another commenter here because it’s equally relevant to what you’re saying:

            …I think this is the core of our disagreement. That quote. For me the quote starts earlier: “I should note that this kind of misogynistic behavior isn’t always mandatory. Often, it’s player-directed, but it is always implicitly encouraged…. Games ask us to play with them. Now that may seem obvious but bear with me. Game developers set up a series of rules, and then within those rules, we’re invited to test the mechanics to see what we can do and what we can’t do. We are encouraged to see how the system will react or respond to our inputs and figure out what is permitted and what is not. The play comes from figuring out the boundaries and possibilities within the game space. So in many of the titles we’ve been discussing, the game makers have set up a series of possible scenarios involving vulnerable, eroticized female characters.(Hitman b-roll begins) Players are then invited to explore and exploit those situation as part of their playthrough.”

            For me, this context is wholly important because 1) it becomes clear that she’s not talking specifically about Hitman but generally about these games and 2) it’s clear that she’s not saying that you have to do this at all. She’s just saying that you can and some do, and you can do it because the devs made it as such. I think that’s the part that so many of her critics are missing out on, and I think it’s because so many of them are motivated by videos like Thunderf00t’s, which doesn’t include that context.

          • Aerensiniac

            We just keep on repeating each other at this point. No matter how you bend this its fundamentally flawed.
            Whether its just hitman or more, you are still facing the problem of intended use.
            In a situation where the game states directly for you that you are penalized for an action, you need to be mentally deranged to feel encouraged to do it.
            You can tell me that the developers enabled you to do said action (which is a completely different point) but to say that you have been encouraged to do it, is directly insane.

            And at the end of the day we are still talking about a scene of 2 beat up female npcs to which you have gotten after a hour or two gaming of massacring male npcs. You do not get a more detailed example of double standards and hypocrisy than this.

            Finally: There is nothing wrong with Thunderf00t’s videos. They are the same trash Anita is making just with an opposing polarity and maybe less hypocrisy, logical fallacies and double standards.
            If the story would not handle about severely mentally deranged people both sides, then Anita’s and F00t’s work would be considered pointless bullshit.
            Welcome to our awesome new world.

          • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

            It is my sincere hope that someday you’ll look back at this and wonder what in the world you were thinking, that someday you’ll say “Oh, I get it. The males you kill in Hitman are irrelevant to the discussion at hand which is specifically the depiction of women in mainstream video games.” Further, I hope you’ll be able to return to this thread in particular and think “What was I thinking arguing that video games are not about exploration and having the ability to self-direct one’s interaction with the game? That’s why games are great!” In the meantime, let’s just call this discussion done. I have no interest in discussing this further, especially when you call an item of discussion “a completely different point” when it is exactly the point: “Game developers set up a series of rules, and then within those rules, we’re invited to test the mechanics to see what we can do and what we can’t do. We are encouraged to see how the system will react or respond to our inputs and figure out what is permitted and what is not.“

          • Aerensiniac

            It is my sincere hope that someday you’ll look back at this and wonder
            what in the world you were thinking, that someday you’ll say “Oh, I get
            it. Implying that the males you kill in Hitman are irrelevant is mentally retarded because you simply exclude the counter argument to a statement”.

            And alas yes: Lets conclude this discussion because i will never agree with this type of industrial clarity hypocrisy.
            You are invited to a game to test the rules and see what is permitted and what is not. Except you keep on insisting that the game encourages and features violence against women even AFTER you have found out that violence against women is penalized in the game.

          • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

            Except you keep insisting that it’s a penalty when it is clearly shown–even in Anita’s video at 22:50–that you eliminate the penalty by hiding the body! YOU GET THE POINTS BACK! That is a reward!

          • Aerensiniac

            You are so desperately grasping at straws mate.
            1. You cant call damage control a reward. The hell is that argument? You set your kitchen on fire, but if you manage to put it out before something explodes or the fire goes out of control, you are “rewarded”? What in the hell did i just read?

            2. Hiding a body (ANY body) awards points. The mechanic is completely unrelated to killing innocents, which is btw penalized higher than what you can get back from hiding a body, thus:

            3. If you paid attention you would have seen that she didnt get as much as half of her lost points back.

            4. Even if that would not be the case, it still wouldnt change the fact that killing those females was penalized by the game, which is pretty much THE POLAR DAMN OPPOSITE OF ENCOURAGING.

            Just drop it please. Anita’s argument is false, hypocritical, swimming in double standards and is generally the best that demagogy can offer.
            Im seriously starting to run out of patience and coherent, rational answers, so really: Just drop it please.

          • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

            Dude, it’s MY WEBSITE! You don’t have to keep responding to comments on it!
            “The subdue ability (performed by taking down an enemy from behind while unarmed) is your friend, and the minor score penalty you receive for knocking out an NPC is completely negated if you hide the body.”
            http://www.gameinformer.com/b/features/archive/2012/11/19/a-beginner-39-s-guide-to-hitman-absolution.aspx

            Furthermore:

            Caleb har Hitman: Absolution 31. jan, 2013 @ 3:27am
            As long as you hide UNCONSCIOUS people, you won’t geht a hit on your score. You get about -150 for knocking someone out, and +150 for hiding him, so it is balanced. But if you kill people, you get a lot of negative points.

            So yes, you can take out as many people as you wish, as long as you don’t kill them and still have boxes and lockers to hide them :)
            #1

            Krusty Krap har Hitman: Absolution 31. jan, 2013 @ 3:52am
            Caleb his point was there indeed is no penalty for killing as long the checkpoint has no targets. All you need to do is kill silently or with a headshot and then hide the body. No penalty. I remember I did Cemetary Entrance this way on purist and got max score. What you said is true for checkpoints with a target though, need to subdue in those or ruin your chances of getting Silent Assassin.
            #2

            Caleb har Hitman: Absolution 31. jan, 2013 @ 7:50am
            Oh, ok, i somehow missed the part where he stated that he is talking about the parts without a target. Well, nevermind then.
            #3

            Cougarific har Hitman: Absolution 31. jan, 2013 @ 8:09pm
            Well now wait you’re saying different things – Caleb says killing vs. subduing incurs a penalty that’s not negated by hiding the body. Krusty says as long as you kill silently and hide the body the score evens out.

            (Thank you for the replies by the way)
            Sist redigert av Cougarific; 31. jan, 2013 @ 8:09pm

            http://steamcommunity.com/app/203140/discussions/0/846944052724673178/?l=norwegian

          • Aerensiniac

            >>Dude, it’s MY WEBSITE! You don’t have to keep responding to comments on it!
            I asked you to stop with the idiotical arguments. Not to stop talking to me.
            When you go as far as to claim that penalty encourages you, there is something broken.

            >>”Thesubdue ability (performed by taking down an enemy from behind while
            unarmed) is your friend, and the minor score penalty you receive for
            knocking out an NPC is completely negated if you hide the body.”
            Too bad this wasnt the case in Anita’s example.
            Oh and while we are at it: You are still trying soooo damn hard to ignore that little word up there ^… lemme bold it out for you.

            >>As long as you hide UNCONSCIOUS people, you won’t geht a hit on your
            score. You get about -150 for knocking someone out, and +150 for hiding
            him, so it is balanced. But if you kill people, you get a lot of
            negative points.
            >>So yes, you can take out as many people as you wish, as long as you don’t kill them and still have boxes and lockers to hide them :)
            So in the end you screwed up even your original point, namely that you get rewarded for this behaviour, because at best you can get back to zero.

            While we are at it, you still kinda missed to explain the part as to how “Players are meant to deprive a perverse pleasure from desecrating the bodies of unsuspecting virtual female characters”…

            #1
            Simplifying this for you cause you seem to have misunderstood the text:
            With some extra work you can circumvent your penalty and make it look like it didnt happen.
            That is called damage control bro, so congratulations on NOT contradicting anything i have said in point 1.

            #2
            >>Oh, ok, i somehow missed the part where he stated that he is talking about the parts without a target. Well, nevermind then.
            I couldnt even find out what this means, but comically enough, this doesnt contradict the second point either.
            You can hide any body inside the game without any regard to its gender, the type of death or ko, positioning, role, etc.

            #3
            >>Well now wait you’re saying different things – Caleb says killing vs.
            subduing incurs a penalty that’s not negated by hiding the body. Krusty
            says as long as you kill silently and hide the body the score evens out.

            Your original point was (i quote) “Except you keep insisting that it’s a penalty when it is clearly shown–even in Anita’s video at 22:50–that you eliminate the penalty by hiding the body! YOU GET THE POINTS BACK! That is a reward!”

            It doesnt matter whether you get 1 point back or everything thus setting you back to zero. To try and pull this off as a reward is literally the best both sophism and demagogy can offer, and funnily enough in the process still remains a strawman because you have incurred a penalty, not a god damn reward.

          • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

            When you aren’t even willing to acknowledge that the video shows a point reduction of 140 points for “pacification” and 140 regained for “body hidden,” it makes it impossible to take seriously anything else you say.

          • Aerensiniac

            You missed the spotted penalty for -1400, but fine, i give: She got -140 and +140, and i sincerely thank you for the another 30 seconds of hardcore strawman riding.

            Call me back once you found out the irony of telling me that its “impossible to take seriously anything” i say while claiming shit like penalities encouraging you, and losing then regaining the exact same amount of points is not damage control.

            We would be over this a lot quicker if you just admitted that your argument is bs, but here comes the Anita’s calibre SJW craze with your ego and feelings preventing you from it, getting you stuck in a perpetual cycle of grasping for straws, straw manning and then trying to save face by telling me that what i say is impossible to take seriously.

            I know the feeling when you do not want to be called wrong on something, but if you cant have the absolute minimum of rationality and admit to (even if to NOBODY ELSE) that you are keeping this bs up because of your emotions and NOT because of rationality, then you are irredeemable.

            I sincerely wish you a good day and the power to sort out your emotional issues.

          • Vicariousfan

            that doesn’t matter. You seem to miss the point that the strippers serve no other purpose but to be killed. They dont’ fight back like most NPCs in the game, they don’t run away or get help they just cower waiting for you to kill them.

            Remember this is the same studio that thought Stripper Assasisns who wear Nun Fetish outfits was a good idea.

            You can rage all you want over this or over Anita but the fact remains that Developers are paying attention. They want the female audience to buy and play their games.

            So you might not see anything wrong with it but the developers do and they are making their games to be more inclusive, because the bottom line is they want those sales figures. Especially when female gamers are less likely to pirate a game.

            So now the developers are saying you are wrong,

          • Aerensiniac

            >>You seem to miss the point that the strippers serve no other purpose but to be killed
            Excuse me boss, but but did it ever occur to you that npcs serve the purpose of ambience? Not to mention that all npcs in hitman are also detectors?
            Yes you have the ability to kill them, but nobody tells you to and in fact: PENALIZES you for doing so. Its like claiming that minecraft has nothing in it but exploitable resources. Too bad that the unity of these trees, blocks, animals, enemies, form a world together with its own traits and aspects.
            Its also noteworthy that there are enemies in hitman which cant be avoided and HAVE to be killed. Did it ever occur you that next to all of these ACTUAL enemies in the game are male?
            How is that not sexism then?

            >>Remember this is the same studio that thought Stripper Assasisns who wear Nun Fetish outfits was a good idea.
            Their humour and concepts leave a lot to be desired. I completely agree with you on that note. For instance in the name of equality i would have liked to see female guards instead of only male.

            >>You can rage all you want over this or over Anita but the fact remains that Developers are paying attention. They want the female audience to buy and play their games.
            Strawman… there is no female gamer anywhere on the planet who would reject a good game just because the hero is not a strong independet woman.
            Do you know why?
            Because actual gamers do not give a damn about gender issues in their games.
            They want entertainment, challenge, graphic, fun and none of these factors depend on genders.

            >>So you might not see anything wrong with it but the developers do and they are making their games to be more inclusive, because the bottom
            line is they want those sales figures. Especially when female gamers are
            less likely to pirate a game.So now the developers are saying you are wrong
            Also a fallacious argument on multiple levels. As i said: the gender issues of a small percentage of people with mental disorders has nothing to do with gaming, but the even larger issue is that this fallacious idiocy is pushed through because of how vocal the feminists are.

            So this argument of yours is a self fulfilling prophecy, a “not even existing problem” which is given birth artificially because some people with issues are moaning about it.
            Its really this simple: If there is a vocal enough bunch of retards, the system, the industry, the developers will react to it.
            This happens every balance patch in every game: People whine the forums full with something and the devs change it, whether it was an actual problem or not.
            The industry reacts only to the chance of improving profit. Not more and not less, and if you whine hard and loud enough, a lot of people will start to believe that their products could give more satisfaction (thus money) if they complied with the demands of some social justice warriors who (like Anita, lol the irony) are not even into gaming, and probably will never touch a game in their life unless they need to prove a point or (once again: just like Anita) want to peel off money from suckers.

          • Vicariousfan

            detectors huh? Yeah look at those NPCs detect him… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3_aC5-3o66k

            No NPCS arne’t just ambiance they are the main obsticle in the game. Every guard is an NPC. Watch how the strippers react its not like other NPCS they just cower and let you kill them.

            NO thats not a logical faliciy its the truth studios are giving her major awards and listening to what she has to say. She is having a bigger impact on the games industry then anyone else right now.

            The market is changing you fail to see that.

            Hold on how did she take money from suckers?

          • Aerensiniac

            >>detectors huh?
            There was no guard to alert by the npcs. Your point?

            >>No NPCS arne’t just ambiance they are the main obsticle in the game.
            You said these girl’s only exist in the game to be killed, and while they are not opponents, i said they are part of the living world the designers tried to create.
            Just because there are friendly/neutral/enemy npcs, it doesnt make my statement any less true, so you didnt contradict what i said.

            >>NO thats not a logical faliciy its the truth studios are giving her
            major awards and listening to what she has to say. She is having a
            bigger impact on the games industry then anyone else right now.
            Once again: You didnt contradict anything i said.

            The industry reacts to vocal opinions. Not more and not less.
            You can be the stupidest son of a b out there, if you are creating a loud enough noise, you will create changes.

            >>The market is changing you fail to see that.
            You are the king of reading issues do you know that?
            Its exactly the opposite: I am fully aware that the market is changing.
            However im also aware that the market is changing because of a professional victim and social justice retard who is creating issues where are none to be loud about.

            >>Hold on how did she take money from suckers?
            Lol okay. Im done.
            Lets just say our opinions differ and be on our separate ways.

          • Vicariousfan

            asking how she took money from suckers is too hard of a question for you?

            That’s all i needed to hear.

            Living breathing world huh? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3_aC5-3o66k

            yeah… look at them let you walk into them and not reacting. So real! Good try kid

            They don’t give out major awards to people creating loud noise. If they did Gamergate would be winning tons of awards instead its being publicly shun by everyone in the Industry.

            You think she’s a professional victim? Well we can easily figure out your views on women. Tell me about how great your girlfriend is….

          • Aerensiniac

            asking how she took money from suckers is too hard of a question for you?
            That’s all i needed to hear.            Wow… thats some pretty high and mighty attitude from someone who is so ignorant towards the topic that he question one of the very first issues with Anita in whole.
            I did not reply to this question because the net is so stock full with youtube videos and even blogs that have a go at Anita’s borderline fraud behaviour, that you can literally drown in them.

            If you are retarded though and cant use google or youtube’s search, then please say so. I will gladly link you the search results.

            yeah… look at them let you walk into them and not reacting. So real! Good try kidRight, because wow look at all the “trees” in minecraft, nothing but blocks, not even reacting…
            You just crossed the line with playing stupid. At this point i actually do believe that you are truly retarded.

            They don’t give out major awards to people creating loud noise.Except they do. Anita is pretty much the perfect example for this.

            You think she’s a professional victim? Well we can easily figure out your views on women. Tell me about how great your girlfriend is….
            I view them as human. Quite ironically just like males.
            And thats pretty much the thin line separating rational thought from being a mentally retarded vocal asshat who should be removed from society completely.

            As for my girl friend: We are married and neither of us suffer from gender issues or borderline personality disorders.
            Call once you figured out the irony of asking more rights for women instead of asking for equality for all human beings.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Jane-Snape/100001971991197 Jane Snape

    Hey, Freddy: Point me to the videos featuring Hitman killings titled “Fun with Bouncers” – not counting any videos that you suddenly decide to create right now just to “prove” me wrong.

    Guess what? There aren’t any.

    And stop pretending that Squee505 is the lone bad apple here. Earnest made a point of screenshotting and quoting at length from the entire comments thread, just to debunk that argument before it could be made.

  • Florence MacKenna

    So what you’re saying is that women should never appear in any killable way in video games ever? Only men should be killable? … I think there’s a word for that kind of thinking… oh, right, sexism.

    Don’t get me wrong, killing strippers for being strippers is sexist, but its on the player in this case. Virtually every NPC in games like this are killable, the fact that some of them HAPPEN to be strippers is only sexist in the same way that SOME of the zombies in Left 4 Dead 2 being black makes it racist.

    Let me be clear; I consider myself a feminist, there are TONS of things in video games and comic books (my two favorite forms of media) that I find objectionable. This… simply isn’t one of them.

    I’m much more bothered by Nintendo’s repeated attempts to further sexualize their one strong female character (Samus Aran) in games ostensibly targeting children, or how the Princess Peach game they made involves such special moves as… crying obnoxiously, or the way female characters are consistently relegated to the positions of love interest, damsel in distress, or eye candy.

    The fact that stripper NPCs merely exist in a game, and happen to be as equally killable as any number of other NPCs in that game, male and female, is simply a non-issue as far as I’m concerned.

    Strippers exist. This game reflects that. Given that strippers are not, in fact, immortal demi-gods, them being killable only makes sense to me.

    • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

      No, that’s not what I’m saying at all. Women should be able to be killed in games. What Anita is saying–and what I agree with–is that there is a problem with the representation of women in these games. Women exist in these games to titillate and be mutilated, and that’s not even the real problem– the real problem is that these tend to be the *only* way women appear in these games.

      Strippers exist, but women in all manner of other occupations exist, too, and they *aren’t* reflected in the game. In that way, this game isn’t a reflection of reality. Hey, go to Google News and search for hit man and strip club or stripper, and you’ll find next to no news stories on the subject. There’s a good reason for that, and it’s because that combination exists more in male fantasies, on film, and in games than it does in real life. I don’t begrudge the game devs the ability to create whatever fantasy world they want, but let’s not act like it’s an accurate depiction of reality.

      • Bob GutSmasha

        “Strippers exist, but women in all manner of other occupations exist, too, and they *aren’t* reflected in the game. In that way, this game isn’t a reflection of reality.”

        All he said was that strippers exist and that some games draw on that. Games provide fractional views of reality, they are limited in scope: no single game can capture every aspect of reality. A Hitman game has a very narrow scope, it doesn’t have to provide an accurate reflection of the workforce.

        The solution to your problem has always existed, variety. What one game cannot accomplish on its own, many can. There are games out there that reflect women in occupations other than sex trades. However, not everything is marketable, not everything is fun either (see Warehouse and Logistics Simulator). There are a games out there for almost all the major consumer groups: if you don’t like games with strip clubs you can buy games that don’t have strip clubs. If you don’t like scantly clad women, you can buy games without scantly clad women.

        There are even games that don’t have humans, occupations, or sexual dimorphism. It’s not just about the choice you have within videogame, you as a consumer have choice too.

        • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

          It seems like we agree, fundamentally, that variety is the solution to the problem. Sarkeesian’s point is that such variety doesn’t really exist, especially in ways that would accurately reflect either the real world or its audience.

          As far as games providing a fractional view of reality, that also goes to the broader point. It isn’t presenting any reality, really. It is a fantasy world, which is fine. In accepting that this is a fantasy world, though, you have to accept that someone created that world and that they are responsible for the things in that world. Someone is responsible for the fact that there are strippers to beat up in Hitman, something that isn’t really reflective of the reality of the larger world of hitmen for hire, and those responsible figures are the game’s creators. Again, this wouldn’t even be an issue if it weren’t a trope that were repeated over and over and over again.

          • Graeme Evans

            your complaining about a lack of diversity and shes talking about one part of one mission in an entire game? there are no other strippers in the rest of the game. have you even played the game to be saying there is a lack of diversity in it?

          • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

            It’s not a lack of diversity in that game– it’s a lack of diversity in gaming, in general. And it’s not that there aren’t singular examples of games that break the mold– it’s that there are far more that conform to the mold.

          • Graeme Evans

            And? 20 years ago + and games were just dots on a screen. Now we have a wider range of types of games and the people that make these games can make them whatever they want them to be. They don’t have to be accurate representations of the world in any way and expecting the carer choices of women to be accurately reflected in games is a ridiculous idea.
            If that’s what you think the games industry a whole should moving towards then when is your pioneering game that proves it’s possible get released?

          • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

            That’s absurd. You don’t have to be a filmmaker to have an opinion about film. You don’t have to be a politician to have an opinion about the direction our country is headed. And you don’t have to be a game dev to have an opinion about the content in games. Games don’t HAVE to be anything. It’s more a question of whether games SHOULD do something, and I believe that they should. They don’t have to accurately reflect the career choices of women, but they SHOULD do a better job of representing women because it would eliminate arguments like the one we’re having and perspectives like the one you hold. The saddest part of your argument is that you’re at odds with what game developers, as a whole, think. While individual game developers may disagree with what some of Sarkeesian’s points are, as a whole, they have embraced her work. The people who are yelling the loudest against Sarkeesian are people like you who have the least at stake. You stand to lose nothing from a broader variety of games that better reflect the ambitions and fantasies of women, and yet you are acting as though it would be the end of gaming for that to happen.

          • Graeme Evans

            you dont get my point. You are complaining about a problem with gaming as though it is something that should be fixed. If you want it fixed you have no right to expect anyone to do it for you so what are you doing about it?

            If any games makers have listened to anita it is because of social pressure. Someone who has no idea how to make games better shouldnt be giving them adgice. Proof of this? She thinks the controls of that freerunning game are too hard for girls…yup, and her game idea falls into the same damsel in distress trope that she complains about.

            I have yet to hear one productive idea from her, one reference of.a.single scientific study or anything beyond her opinion.
            As a teacher it offends me that she thinks what she has made is worthy of use in any educational setting, it is propaganda and lies at best.

            Also I find it quite funny you claim I am at odds with what developers want. Both because of the idea you think you know what game developers want, and because I havent even said what I think games should be. All I have done is point out how rediculous your arguments are.

            Also, exactly what ‘perspective’ that I hold are you blathering on about? Youre the one complaining about the diversity of careers of artificial women characters in games were men are universally treated cannon fodder but you dont seem to give a crap about that, its all issues with women in your messed up perspective.

          • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

            I honestly feel like I have to do all you guys’ research for you. Anita Sarkeesian was the recipient of the Game Developers’ Choice Awards Ambassador Award this year, and she won it because the Game Dev community feels like her work is helping move games toward a better place. http://www.gamechoiceawards.com/archive/ambassador.html

            So now are you going to tell me that you have a better idea of what the game dev community wants or needs than it does, itself?

          • Guest

            Also here: this is an example of a game where Anita’s critique of Hitman would actually apply: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dWxhRDJhU44

            These games aren’t mainstream but they exist. She has plenty of genuine material to draw from instead of distorting random games.

          • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

            Actually, this would be a poorer argument for Anita because it is the presence of this imagery in mainstream media that she is critiquing, not ham-fisted games no one has played.

          • Graeme Evans

            actually, the votes are cast by an invitation only group of people from the game industry, “international choice awards network”. i can find no list of who these select group are or who decides who gets invited to vote so i can’t eliminate the possibility of political bias. It also says that they vote on 10 awards. there are more than ten so i can only assume there is another system for the special awards nominees that isn’t disclosed.

            the reason why she won is because she has the biggest face in the media from using the abuse she got to win sympathy.
            either way winning an award doesn’t change the fact she has no evidence what so ever that games are causing sexism. She is still around because no one has the ability to tell her her opinion is valueless to them because if they did then they are instantly branded a misogynist for pointing out her lack of qualifications.

          • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

            You should never eliminate the possibility of political bias. People are politically biased. I am politically biased.

          • Gregg Braddoch

            lol, this is akin to the President receiving the Nobel Peace Prize and then supporting multiple wars, and keeping our troops overseas after he promised to bring them home.

          • Bob GutSmasha

            You don’t have to be a director in order to critique film, but you do have to have a credible academic record or familiarity with the material in order to present sound arguments.

            Anita’s videos fail basic academic practice: in her latest video she references not a single academic work related to the topic; she links to opinion pieces and blogs; the only two credible references are sexual assault statics from 2011-2012 which have nothing to do with videogames.

            And that is just the infrastructure of her argument. Her points themselves are individually disproved, she is presenting opinion and subjective interpretation as fact and using other subjective opinions as reference. It is a vacuum.

            The argument of what games should or shouldn’t do ultimately is decided by consumers wallets, not the gaming press or even developers: and consumers want games, toys, experiences free of political baggage. Anita was backed by a mere 7000 people; assuming even 100% of them were gamers this is a minuscule portion of our community.

            There is no harm in creating a market for them, someone surely will: but this does not mean a radical reworking of game aesthetic is on the way, nor should it be necessary.

          • Graeme Evans

            Well said

          • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

            That isn’t true at all. Pauline Kael never graduated college, thus never had a credible academic record, and turned that into one of the most revered careers in all of film criticism. Anita Sarkeesian has more than proven a familiarity with the content of modern games.

            I have yet to see her individual points disproven. In fact, consensus seems to be forming around the validity of her arguments with a minority devoted as much to pillorying her as invalidating her arguments.

            It is ridiculous to argue that what goes in or doesn’t go in a game should be decided by dollars, alone, or even that they will be decided by dollars alone. There are too many individual decisions that must be rendered in the creation of a game for a “free-market*” approach to determine them all. That is where the whim of the creator comes in. That is the work of a human, and as a human we have a responsibility to be aware of the impact our actions have on other humans.

          • Bob GutSmasha

            As I said, academic record “or familiarity with the material.” That familiarity is usually expressed by a body of work and criticism evaluated over time. Her familiarity appears dubious when she incorrectly portrays games such as Hitman (or how she literally lied about a character Krystal featuring as the sole character of a cancelled game), and only analyses portions of the market.

            What has not been disproved? This blog post itself was an attempt to dismiss ‘one point’ in a video that made several rebuttals, and your argument actually strengthened the position it opposed. Out of hundreds, perhaps thousands of LP videos of this game, you found 8 of people playing in a way that Anita presented as ‘the standard.’ She didn’t even mention that the game penalized her behaviour, it was dishonest.

            Anita deplores a lack of variety, yet she only analyses a portion of the market. Grab a 3DS, browse Steam, leave the AAA action shelf; hell, there’s are whole detective genre dedicated to intelligent, intuitive female lead characters. What about The Sims? One of the most financially successful series and it allows you to play a socially and financially independent woman.

            “It is ridiculous to argue that what goes in or doesn’t go in a game should be decided by dollars, alone.”

            It is not ridiculous, see: Clover Studio, Raven Software, Shenmue 3, Megaman Legends 3, Psychonauts for notable examples. Otherwise https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Defunct_video_game_companies for general overview.

            Note that this does not even show you how financial pressures have changed game development and game delivery. The independent market enjoys more freedoms but there is a lot less money invested and, arguably, far less quality delivered. I’m not happy about it, Shenmue is one of my favourite games and the trilogy might never be complete due to a lack of financial success, but it’s how the market operates right now.

            “That is the work of a human, and as a human we have a responsibility to be aware of the impact our actions have on other humans.”

            What impact has a game that “you do not have to purchase,” that “you do not have to play,” that “openly advertises its contents,” and one that “is subject to law” had on you?

          • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

            Again, Pauline Kael began with a familiarity not much larger than the average filmgoer’s.

            Again, she’s not saying that Hitman is only about dispatching strippers. She’s saying there’s a part of it that mirrors a trope that is repeated throughout games.

            Are you serious? First off, my blog post goes right at the heart of Thunderf00t’s argument regarding what he saw as wholesale misrepresentation of a game and the culture around the game. I used one screenshot to discredit that argument, and we both know there are far more than 8 examples out there of people playing Hitman the way that Thunderf00t flat-out says people don’t. That would just require a SECOND screenshot, which I’d happily provide.

            Finally, Anita isn’t making a video series about the state of all games. She is analyzing one thing, the portrayal of women in mainstream games and how those form a series tropes that, at best, are lazy game development and, at worse, are actually harmful to women in the aggregate. Finally, that one of the most financially successful non-AAA series features the character you describe would be an economic argument to make more such games, according to your wallet argument.

          • Bob GutSmasha

            Yeah I know what you are saying, Pauline Kael began at some point and grew into a respected role. Anita has also began and time will tell what role she has in the future: it doesn’t change the fact that her ‘research’ links to opinion blogs and statistics not related to videogaming. Pauline never painted herself as a researcher.

            On Hitman, she is not saying “there’s a part of it that mirrors a trope.” Here is her quote:

            “The player cannot help but treat these female bodies as things to be acted upon,because they were designed, constructed and placed in the environment for that singular purpose. Players are meant to derive a perverse pleasure from desecrating the bodies of unsuspecting virtual female characters.”

            Do you see it earnestp? “The player cannot help…” “Players are meant to…” come on, you must be able to see what I am talking about. I don’t know if you play games or play that series but Hitman is a sandbox stealth game, not a sexual fetish simulator. She misrepresents the game and the culture behind it. Look at their fan forums http://www.hitmanforum.com/ you won’t find people discussing sex, they just talk about their favourite game.

            “Finally, Anita isn’t making a video series about the state of all games. She is analyzing one thing, the portrayal of women in mainstream games and how those form a series tropes that, at best, are lazy game development and, at worse, are actually harmful to women in the aggregate.”

            The problem is that the mainstream market is not targeted towards feminists, it targets people who do not interpret what they see from a feminist context. When they see a stripper in Hitman they just see an NPC to avoid so they don’t ruin their score: when Anita sees the same NPC she sees objectification. Two people experiencing the same game in very different ways, can you see it? Surely you can. Anita’s view is fine, it’s her personal subjective interpretation. She has every right to share it and say “this is what this game made me feel like” and if other women feel the same they should speak out. But that is very different to saying “this is what this game is about, this is what these players do.”

            “Finally, that one of the most financially successful non-AAA series features the character you describe would be an economic argument to make more such games, according to your wallet argument.”

            You mean The Sims? It is a AAA release, sorry I assumed you would be familiar with it so I didn’t expand on it. It is one of the most popular game series with gamers of both genders and allows you to make a character and simulate their life. Women have the same opportunities as men and aren’t discriminated against.

            Unfortunately they aren’t always financially successful: checkout http://www.gog.com/game/dreamfall_the_longest_journey It’s an adventure game with a strong female protagonist. It’s the sequel to a similar game and very well received by critics, it sold well on PC but not on Xbox. So there’s even difference in what the different hardware markets want to play.

            Again variety solves some of these issues, and there is plenty of alternative games that don’t feature sexualization. Does that mean that everything is fine? No, I genuinely don’t like how women are portrayed in things like Soulcalibur but you need to make an honest argument.

            I feel like Anita will achieve a good thing despite her flawed approach, so maybe it doesn’t matter: but what I’ve been trying to say to you is that Hitman is not being correctly represented; 8 videos and two screenshots would not be accepted if you were submitting your findings to a research department. You would need a sample of say 100 videos and maybe 10 or 20 of the top rated comments from each of those videos in order to have a finding.

            If you want AAA games were women are genuinely objectified I can give you plenty (http://residentevil.wikia.com/Rachael_Foley) there was no need to be dishonest about Hitman.

          • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

            I think this is the core of our disagreement. That quote. For me the quote starts earlier: “I should note that this kind of misogynistic behavior isn’t always mandatory. Often, it’s player-directed, but it is always implicitly encouraged…. Games ask us to play with them. Now that may seem obvious but bear with me. Game developers set up a series of rules, and then within those rules, we’re invited to test the mechanics to see what we can do and what we can’t do. We are encouraged to see how the system will react or respond to our inputs and figure out what is permitted and what is not. The play comes from figuring out the boundaries and possibilities within the game space. So in many of the titles we’ve been discussing, the game makers have set up a series of possible scenarios involving vulnerable, eroticized female characters.(Hitman b-roll begins) Players are then invited to explore and exploit those situation as part of their playthrough.”

            For me, this context is wholly important because 1) it becomes clear that she’s not talking specifically about Hitman but generally about these games and 2) it’s clear that she’s not saying that you have to do this at all. She’s just saying that you can and some do, and you can do it because the devs made it as such. I think that’s the part that so many of her critics are missing out on, and I think it’s because so many of them are motivated by videos like Thunderf00t’s, which doesn’t include that context.

          • Bob GutSmasha

            It’s definitely a more rounded argument when you start from that point, and you are right it should start from there since it gives her whole argument against that particular game. But even there she is arguing that “it is always implicitly encouraged” and ultimately finishes her argument with the “Players are meant to derive a perverse pleasure from desecrating the bodies of unsuspecting virtual female characters.” The game really doesn’t encourage you to harm innocent people.

            You know, it’s weird she picked on Hitman because, honestly, this is her best video yet. From 15:10 she gives a very reasonable outlook on the stripclub aspect of GTA, and all the examples up to this point are well chosen. It’s as though she felt a ‘violence against women’ aspect was essential so she hamfisted the Hitman example and some smaller ones.

            It’s a shame because otherwise it is a good video.

          • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

            You know what? This is the best outcome I could have hoped for in this discussion. We’ll continue to disagree specifically about Hitman, but I’m ok with that. In fact, I think do that is something that is open to interpretation. Personally, I don’t think she is attempting to single out Hitman in that section, but I can see how others would think she was singling it out, given it is the sole game used for B-roll there.

            The truth is I wish there were many more videos like Anita’s, even videos like Anita’s but countering her ideas. I like thinking about the games, books, movies, and music I consume, and I want many more people to make videos exploring the ideas behind games.

          • Bob GutSmasha

            I think the fact that she is the only person voicing her side of the view is probably part of the problem; it makes her the sole platform of discussion and also places a larger burden of proof on her.

            The only counter video to Anita I found that avoided the ‘ThunderfootAmazingAtheist’ style vitriol was by a Youtuber called KiteTails https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HJihi5rB_Ek

          • Bob GutSmasha

            There are a number of problems with what you are saying. Anita’s assertion that there is no variety (using a feminist criteria) is only true if you limit your view to individual genres, aesthetics, or market groups. For example: shooting, or general action games, are primarily male driven experiences full of stereotypes. Those games are sold to a particular market, a market that does not internalize the experience from a feminist perspective.There are few games within that genre that break the male driven mould (there are very notable exceptions however, such as Perfect Dark and No One Lives Forever). Branch out from that genre though, look at the entirety of the market, and you will find games that don’t even have men in them. I bought a 3DS for my mother and she has yet to be confronted with anything insulting to her as a woman. There are markets other than action, and they are being catered to. Anita isn’t just choosing a section of a game to analyse, she is choosing a section of the market.

            Back to Hitman, the entire game is not a stripper harassment simulation. It is one section of the game, and yes you can harm civilians: because it is a game design decision that applies to the entire game. It would be arbitrary to make certain NPCs invincible in a Hitman game, the challenge (and option) of performing a perfect mission is made meaningful by their existence.

            There is a contradiction in what you have been arguing that I would try to highlight:

            “Sarkeesian’s point is that such variety doesn’t really exist, especially in ways that would accurately reflect either the real world or its audience.”

            “As far as games providing a fractional view of reality, that also goes to the broader point. It isn’t presenting any reality, really. It is a fantasy world, which is fine.”

            On the one hand, you are arguing that it is imperative that games reflect the real world and their audience; on the other, you accept that games are fundamentally not real, are a fantasy, and that this “is fine.”

            Games have the freedom to depart from the real world and are not required to depict the issues of the societies they draw inspiration from. If games were to actually reflect society, you would be horrified. Here in Australia “a woman is killed every week by a partner or ex-partner.” (Mouzos & Makkai 2004) By you criteria, not only would Hitman have to depict a strip club, but also the type of domestic violence committed against women. Not only that, but the option to harm women would have to be part of that realistic depiction.

            In real life, we all have the option to harm others, some games reflect this. Often the player behaves inversely to how they would in real life; in fact, this is the main appeal and market strategy behind games like GTA. Why do people behave like this in those games? Because the contrast to their real-life behaviour creates an internal spectacle for the player, i.e. it’s an unusual experience. How can violence against others be contextualized into fun? Only when it is experienced in a safe environment, i.e. no one is hurt because the people dying are not real.

            Regardless, most games do not let you harm innocent NPCs; most games do not let you harm innocent women. That is not some rhetoric either, we can go through games individually if you would like and it will stand correct. The overwhelming majority of games in existence, actively prevent you from hurting women.

          • Mirian lux

            generally, most strippers are women, however,in the rest of the game, there are maids, cooks, security guards and a variety of professions with men and women, if “variety is the solution to the problem”, I do not see why the critique of hitman

          • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

            The fact that your list of professionals started with maids and cooks is why the critique–not just of Hitman but of the broader issue of representation in games.

  • Bob GutSmasha

    “accusing Sarkeesian of cherry-picking content from video games and distorting it to prove her point — never mind that you can’t cherry pick anything when there are no cherries.”

    Umm, you can cherry-pick… Anita takes a small section from a game, ‘chooses’ to molest dead bodies, but then presents it as though all players ‘will’ do this. It’s dishonest.

    “Let’s go to the sidebar. Here we quickly come across seven other videos that speak to Sarkeesian’s point about the sexual objectification of women in games. When you’re done with “Fun With Strippers,” maybe you’d like to hop over to “Stripper Challenge?” Spoiler alert: In this video of a challenge hidden in the game, a stripper dances sexually in a window before the gamer decides to kill her, despite the penalty he’ll be assessed.”

    Again, you found seven videos out of god knows how many Hitman LPs where players ‘choose’ to behave a certain way. And who are they hurting? Pixels. I just slaughtered probably five-hundred Latin drug-dealers in Scarface: The World Is Yours, does that mean I’m going to turn into a racist? Of course not, likewise I’m not going to start objectifying women around me because I visited a strip club in GTA.

    If there is a game that you find particularly obnoxious, just don’t buy it.

  • Graeme Evans

    if anything this shows that some people are sexist, not that games are sexist.

    any proof at all that the games changed these people and made them want to actually kill real life strippers?

  • Bob GutSmasha

    So, an American think tank has actually responded to Anita’s a few days ago. It uses actual research to explain why games are targeted towards a male audience (since they form the largest consumer group) and that, not only is there no evidence that these games are making male gamers misogynist and sexist, but that ‘millennium males’ are less prejudiced than previous generations.

    http://www.aei.org/issue/society-and-culture/race-and-gender/factual-feminist/

    • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

      Actually, she doesn’t really discuss in her video whether games are sexist or not. In fact, it’s just the opposite. Notice at 3:44, that she says that these critics have made a lot of good points about sexist tropes in video games (though she isn’t willing to acknowledge which ones). The part that cracked me up was when she said “I have spent the last few weeks looking into gamer culture.” Ironically, the same people who tend to applaud this video tend to criticize Anita Sarkeesian for not being adequate enough a gamer.

      Here’s the big difference between CHS (whose work I used to read in my less enlightened days) and Anita Sarkeesian. Go to Feminist Frequency’s website, look at the body of each of her blog posts, and you’ll see a bibliography of links to studies and opinion pieces. Now look in the body of the CHS post– nada.

      I think you just have to keep returning to what Sarkeesian is actually saying: That sexist tropes exist. That the existence of these tropes are problematic for women. She’s not saying these tropes cause sexism, but she is saying that these tropes promote a sexist perspective.

      • Bob GutSmasha

        Aha! We’re back at this point again :)

        “I think you just have to keep returning to what Sarkeesian is actually saying: That sexist tropes exist.”

        Dude the tropes exist, and the sexualization too, dismissing that isn’t the point of the video.

        A) The gaming market has variety, not all games have these issues.
        B) There is no research that proves that engaging with these games has made men more prejudiced. The video argues that ‘millennium males’ are less prejudiced. (but doesn’t provide link to that research)

        I think B is the most important because, if Anita can prove that sexist games make people more prejudiced against women, then all aspects of media would have to be scrutinised: violence, drugs, sex etc. all our media would have to be re-evaluated.

        “She’s not saying these tropes cause sexism, but she is saying that these tropes promote a sexist perspective.”

        Isn’t a sexist perspective by definition sexist and therefore sexism? I’m not trying to be a smart arse, bare with me a bit; she says this at the end of her Women as Background Part 1 video:

        “Compounding the problem is the widespread belief that, despite all the evidence, exposure to media has no real world impact. While it may be comforting to think we all have a personal force field protecting us from outside influences, this is simply not the case.

        Paradoxically and somewhat ironically, those who most strongly believe that media is just harmless entertainment are also the ones most likely to uncritically internalize harmful media messages.

        In short, the more you think you cannot be affected, the more likely you are to be affected.”

        I feel like Anita’s argument more or less relies on this being true. Consider this: What if some games were sexist, but didn’t make players sexist? What if not all games are sexist? Women aren’t forced to play sexist games, and the men playing them wouldn’t project any expectations derived from videogames on them. That’s the sort of reality Sommers is arguing exists right now: so in that world, the evaluation of tropes by Anita is valuable from an artistic enrichment perspective, but not evidence of gaming leading to any harm.

        Like you said though, there’s no references in the Sommers video. I’d love to see the research taken further and made into a proper academic reply, it’s more interesting than personal attacks, though some gaming media has responded to Sommers by doing just that rather than addressing her points (and ended up a bit shame faced like Kotaku).

        • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

          1) Anita has never said there isn’t variety in gaming. She has only ever discussed the presence of an overwhelmingly massive amount of specific types of imagery in games. And when each of her videos can be roughly 30 minutes long and incorporate dozens and dozens of games, as you said, “Dude, the tropes exist!”

          2) Anita is not arguing a cause and effect of X imagery affecting Y person in Z manner, which I believe is one of the things many of her detractors misunderstand. Her argument is, instead, that all this imagery helps reinforce cultural stereotypes about women, which is ultimately unhelpful to women in their larger struggle for equality in all things, including visibility in media, and the reason it is unhelpful is because the people who are least likely to believe there is a problem accept the imagery they are receiving as normal.

          Christina Hoff Somers doesn’t really take an issue with any of Anita’s real points. She spends half the video talking about the larger cultural context of the public’s attitude toward gamers as a substitute for Anita’s actual arguments. It doesn’t matter, for example, that the public has been afraid of games or gamers, unless her point is that Anita is just part of a tradition of scare-mongering. But even if that is her point, that Anita is just another one of these scare-mongers, she undermines herself by acknowledging that Anita makes many valid points!

          • Bob GutSmasha

            1) I’m not sure what Anita’s stance is on variety, the thing is though, variety is the solution to the issue of ‘overwhelming imagery.’ I personally don’t think there is enough variety within the major gaming genres (not just in terms of gender, but race, culture etc.). But taken as a whole the gaming industry has enough games that, if you were particularly sensitive and strategic as a consumer, you could choose games that don’t have tropes you find offensive. There is enough variety to avoid ‘overwhelming imagery,’ and you can also choose not to play videogames, nobody is forced to engage with any media.

            2) That doesn’t quite ring true with the passage I quoted from Anita. She states that we don’t have protection from outside influences: “While it may be comforting to think we all have a personal force field protecting us from outside influences, this is simply not the case.” You also state that certain people interpret “the imagery they are receiving as normal.” If we take Anita’s view, games are ‘influencing’ the player, yet there is no evidence that players have become more prejudiced, violent, or influenced through videogames. Likewise the idea you add, that people interpret the imagery as ‘normal,’ needs evidence too. How do you know people are not differentiating between fantasy and reality? It seems ridiculous to me from, I admit, an anecdotal position: the people I interact with in my daily life are ‘all’ completely different to the fantasies portrayed in our entertainment media, my brain is aware of the boundaries.

            “Christina Hoff Somers doesn’t really take an issue with any of Anita’s real points.”

            Well, she does. Like said, pointing out tropes is useful: the following is just my take but, it adds to analysis and discussion of games.

            What Sommers says though, is that the games are now inclusive which limits the implications of Anita’s criticism as you don’t have to play those games with tropes. ‘Those’ games are made for a male audience, they are silly, maybe offensive, but have not been ‘proven’ to cause any harm or influence people. Again, it’s about markets. At the start of the video and towards the end it is emphasized that men are the main consumer base. She equates Anita’s criticism to that of a man criticizing women’s magazines for revolving around women.

            A ‘solution’ (if women not being interested in games is even a problem) is to get more women into both game development and AAA gaming. I think that’s already happening though, people like Robin Hunicke working on games like Journey and forwarding game analysis.

          • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

            1) Do you think that is a valid comparison? Comparing mainstream games to mens’ magazines?

            2) Why wouldn’t women feel the same market pressure as men to market to men if, in fact, they are the portion of the market that really matters?

          • Bob GutSmasha

            1) I think so, at least, I can’t see any obvious reason why literature isn’t comparable to gaming if speaking in terms of marketing and genres. There are interests men & women (as a consumer group) don’t always share, so products are made to cater to specific groups. The contents are advertised, so if you don’t like it you don’t have to buy it. I understand that people against gender conventions dislike the idea of male or female magazines, but if you wanted to change that you can start your own car magazine that doesn’t have half-naked women hanging off every conceivable handle.

            Gaming will never be so divided I hope (I don’t see Hitman as a ‘male only’ game), but consumer groups are a fairly standard aspect of our capitalist societies; they are not inherently evil.

            2) I’m sorry if I have misunderstood the question, I think you are asking me: if men are the main consumer group, why don’t women feel the pressure to make their magazines more male friendly?

            Assuming that is the question, the answer could be that: men are already being catered for by various magazines. However, investors see a ‘female’ market large enough to be sustainable so they invest into it without removing or altering the already existing content. There are also gender neutral magazines that exist alongside these. Historically the answer is probably a bit different though. Men had a dictatorial grip on literature for a long time; social taboos, prejudice subside enough and then you have the explosion of the Gothic novel; suddenly women are a huge market.

            Possibly something similar will happen with gaming, I think The Sims and Facebook games could have a similar role for gaming that the Gothic novel had for literature.
            ————————————————-

            I’m curious what you think of the above but I’d like to ask you a specific question. Do games like Hitman (including the tropes they hold) need to stop being made? Or, alternatively, are you comfortable with a game like Hitman existing alongside games that don’t have gender tropes and letting the consumers decide what they buy?

          • http://mellifluent.info earnestp

            No, I don’t think games like Hitman need to stop being made. I think that having games like Hitman exist alongside other games that lack such tropes is clearly the goal. I think that many game devs are unaware of just how frequently a lot of these tropes are reused in all games. My hope would be that as game devs become more aware of the images that they perpetuate, that they will find some motivation to do things differently. After all, this is essentially a question of lazy writing. My hope would also be that the audience becomes a little smarter in its media consumption, but I feel that way about all media. We get trained on how to read, think and write about literature in school– I think we should have similar training across all visual media. Whether you agree with Anita or not, she’s thinking about and expounding on video games in a way that few other people are doing.

          • Bob GutSmasha

            I think that’s a fair enough position, we just ultimately disagree on two points.

            That variety, Hitman coexisting with games that lack gender tropes, already exists when you include the entire market and all genres. It’s finding its way into the AAA market too, I know Journey technically isn’t a AAA game but it received a similar reception and success; then you have The Sims etc.

            Finally, not everybody has to enjoy media at the same level. People have the right to play something like Hitman or Mario without having to contextualize it from an academic perspective. Is Hitman lazy in writing? Sure, but for its intended audience it is also great entertainment. It’s not a game made to please arts students or academics. Anita is criticizing games from a moral rather than purely aesthetic ground, it’s an angle fairly limited in scope so I’m not sure how much she really forwards game critique; especially considering how the target audience is ignored and how they play misrepresented.

          • Gregg Braddoch

            “Is Hitman lazy in writing? Sure, but for its intended audience it is also great entertainment.”

            And criticizing games soley on the basis of “writing” is also absurd. Hitman is still great fun to play, and that is where the focus of the majority of AAA titles is.

            I mean seriously, does someone think that any Mario game is going to have a literature worthy story? Of course not. It’s a platformer, and it is good at what it does. Doesn’t need a realistic story.

      • Gregg Braddoch

        “Here’s the big difference between CHS (whose work I used to read in my less enlightened days)”

        You mean before she started advocating for men & boys as well as women & girls.

        “Go to Feminist Frequency’s website, look at the body of each of her blog posts, and you’ll see a bibliography of links to studies and opinion pieces.Now look in the body of the CHS post– nada.”

        A. Look at Anita’s videos for all of her sources. Oh wait, they aren’t there? Just on her website only? Wonder why?

        B. One of her “sources” is Andrea Dworkin, the lady that said all PIV intercourse is rape. Such intelligent. Much credible, so amaze. A read over the rest of her citations shows that they either have terrible methodology, or that she completely misrepresents the studies.

        “I think you just have to keep returning to what Sarkeesian is actually saying: That sexist tropes exist. That the existence of these tropes are problematic for women. ”

        For which she has zero evidence, even among her “sources”.

        “She’s not saying these tropes cause sexism, but she is saying that these tropes promote a sexist perspective.”

        I’m gonna let you think long and hard about the reasoning behind that statement.

        Then I will say what is the difference between “causing sexism” and “promoting a sexist perspective” – I guess in your mind, “making people buy Kellogg’s cereal” isn’t in any way similar to “promoting the purchase of Kellogg’s cereal”. There is a SLIGHT difference – one can ignore the Kellogg’s advertising if one so chooses – If that is what Sarkeesian is saying “video games promote a sexist perspective” but “you can ignore this and not be affected” then the title of her entire video series should be “Why bother watching this?” – But she isn’t saying this, she is saying “the less likely you think you are to be affected, the more likely you are to be affected” (completely misrepresenting the 3rd person effect theory while she makes this statement) – So your argument is just plain wrong.

        I guess I HAVE to go get myself some McDonalds because I saw it on TV. It says they have healthy salads, and their meat isn’t horsemeat. I guess this overrides my judgement and affects me strongly, because I think that I am unlikely to be swayed by McDonalds advertising, considering that the quality of their food is null. But thinking this way will get me eventually, because you know, I think I am unlikely to be affected.

  • John

    You don’t have to read any farther than this:

    “She’s a feminist YouTuber who had the audacity to create a series of videos on anti-feminist tropes in video games.”

    To see how the SJWs are dishonestly framing the discussion

    Yeah….. *thats* why people have a problem with anita. Nothing to do with her history, her actions, her dishonesty, and not even the specific content of those videos.

    It must all be because misogyny.

  • Eric Soller

    While I agree with this author’s conception of Thunderf00t, I think that there’s much more to be said about his arguments than can be captured in a measly screenshot.

    It’s made clear from the very beginning that no matter how many good points Sarkeesian (or any person who calls him/herself a feminist) makes, all is lost by Mason’s anti-feminism bias, as he paints her as just another one of his dumb “fem-nazis” to debunk, repeatedly taking quotes out of context to fit his agenda. Instead of addressing the issue of women being objects in video games in the perspective of game writing, Mason goes great lengths to objectify it as an actual hypothetical situation. Why? Because it makes Sarkeesian easier to attack with the same straw man tactic that he often criticizes other people for using in his other videos. For example, from the Damsel in Distress video, making the issue about whether or not to rescue the woman is absurdly irrelevant to game writing and tropes. It would be like if I were to review a fantasy novel on the basis of the laws of physics.

    When the role of the woman in so many games can easily be replaced by a valuable inanimate object without affecting game-play, that’s the feminist issue being addressed. Simply reading the title of Sarkeesian’s videos should be able to clarify this: Tropes vs. Women. Reading the title of Mason’s video, “Feminism versus FACTS” clarifies his fundamental misunderstanding of what feminism actually is. Needless to say, anybody can offer a well-rounded opinion, but no matter how twisted the modern definition of feminism has become, if you don’t look past the word and into the context in which it’s used, then you’re not qualified to criticize anything.