Tropes vs. Women / #GamerGate Conspiracies

[Brushfire]

This is more of a nitpick than anything, but shouldn't episode 2 come out by now?

I mean me, Steve, and Logan shoot one day a week, have full time jobs, and still put out about 3 videos a week. She has 160K and no need to work a full time job. Shouldn't these come out a little bit faster. I know you gotta do research and write, but c'mon.

[PixelPanic]

You would think, but you shouldn't. The next one will be out by 2014 (tentative possibility).

[Dexie]

This is more of a nitpick than anything, but shouldn't episode 2 come out by now?

I mean me, Steve, and Logan shoot one day a week, have full time jobs, and still put out about 3 videos a week. She has 160K and no need to work a full time job. Shouldn't these come out a little bit faster. I know you gotta do research and write, but c'mon.

Considering the entire series was meant to be done in December and no one complained then, I'm going to assume she's going to keep taking her time with these.

[The Derrit]

Considering the entire series was meant to be done in December and no one complained then, I'm going to assume she's going to keep taking her time with these.

Once it stops generating youtube income she'll make another one.

[Xelebes]

I appreciate this Jimquisition video because it actually goes through the effort to assert that this treatment of women is a norm, and that this norm is harmful. Having to battle with publishers over the role of your game's character *based specifically on their gender* is strong evidence that some sort of gender discrimination is going on. Now, not all gender discrimination is harmful -- I don't think a gynecologist should have to see both males & females, for example. But when Jim shows that a leading or co-leading female character either gets relegated to the back-of-the-box *because of what the publisher sees as gaming norms*, or that the developer must raise hell to see them put in their deserved prominent position, it's a lot easier to conclude that this is a harmful discrimination.

Additionally, I appreciate Jim's reflections on the complexity of the problem: is it chicken or egg? Are the publishers too sensitive to perceived preference, or are these actual community preferences? Where exactly is the blame to be placed: with the makers, the marketers, the gamers, or a combination of all three?

Anita's video on the other hand seems to skip over all these subtleties and launches straight for a "harmful & pernicious" bashing of a single trope which she does not satisfactorily establish as a norm. There are no useful statistics given about how many games feature this damsel in distress. Nor, in her videos, does she give strong evidence that female characters have been forced into this role as a matter of norms. We are given the Krystal in Star Fox Adventures example. But Anita merely states that she does become a damsel in distress, nowhere stating that Krystal was forced to conform to it as a norm. And this single data point cannot be extrapolated to a trend. Mentioning several other games does not make it a trend either, as how many thousands of games have been released since the Atari? I have to bring in my PERSONAL experience, psychologically biased memory, to surmise that yes this probably is an overused trope. I'm not saying that damsel in distress isn't a trend -- but merely that Anita never adequately demonstrates it's symptomatic.

We never even get to hear if the damsel is used in the majority of games which feature a female. Just stating this one statistic -- the percentage of female-featuring games which use one as a rescue trophy -- could make or break the argument. If it's a low percentage, then it's difficult to attack this trope unless you wish to ban telling those kinds of events altogether, but if it's the majority, we can definitely see the need to reflect on game industry practices and make more frequent use of other story types. But when we don't hear any such decisive statistic, instead a long string of anecdotal examples or just straight up logical leaps, jumping right into the trope's harm feels like quite an overreach. Overall, I think we should expect better reasoning from Anita, even if these videos weren't as heavily funded.

Again, I'm not saying that games -- and probably all media -- don't have harmful stereotypes regarding women. The ease alone of writing stereotypical roles makes that absurdly unlikely. I just wish Anita would give a better argument than she does, instead of leaning so heavily on the "female stereotypes = bad" attitude prevalent in modern Western culture. In addition, I'd really love to see someone explore the harmful male stereotypes in media. Male, female, or other, we're all in this life thing together and I really hate to hear one gender attack another, no matter what for.

My issue with that assessment is that it raises the question as to what level of exposure does Jim there have than Anita does not. Is Anita solely in the consumer side, only able to express her frustration as a consumer and only involves herself in the consumption of the game. What Jim seems to do is diving deeper into the media releases that are ancilliary to the games, going beyond mere consumer, to glean a different depth of the problem. There are others who can provide production side criticism, as Jim is able to reference but unable to provide. It is wise to include the producers and the consumers in this debate.

[Arek the Absolute]

disregard

Edited June 15, 2019 by Arek the Absolute
i was an idiot

[zircon]

Considering the massive backlash she is getting from her own "feminist" peers, as well as what she as created with this crud, I honestly disagree.

The only thing I need to say is that her video inspired a 35 page discussion here that has been one of the most civil and informed on OCR, a few stupid posts notwithstanding. Not to mention the gender roles thread in PPR that got split out. Unless you think everything is so peachy and rosy in the world of gender that we're all worse off for having discussed it at all.

As if there was anything else needed to prove that this is nothing but a cash grab.

This is really, needlessly hostile, aggressive, and baseless. Nothing Anita has done merits this kind of accusation. There's literally 0 evidence for it whatsoever, so it only speaks to your own bias.

As for the schedule: there are plenty of YouTube and internet video celebrities who release videos far less often than once a month. Off the top of my head, the AVGN comes to mind. I love his material of course but in 2012 he only did a handful of episodes, and obviously he is making far more money than Anita. It hasn't even been a month since the first episode came out.

[Gario]

This is more of a nitpick than anything, but shouldn't episode 2 come out by now?

I mean me, Steve, and Logan shoot one day a week, have full time jobs, and still put out about 3 videos a week. She has 160K and no need to work a full time job. Shouldn't these come out a little bit faster. I know you gotta do research and write, but c'mon.

Yeah, I've been wondering about this, myself. The lack of time table is also certainly troublesome.

As for the schedule: there are plenty of YouTube and internet video celebrities who release videos far less often than once a month. Off the top of my head, the AVGN comes to mind. I love his material of course but in 2012 he only did a handful of episodes, and obviously he is making far more money than Anita. It hasn't even been a month since the first episode came out.

Yeah, but in the case of those videos they weren't paid 160k$ to do so, so no one expects them to come out regularly (unless otherwise noted, like Nostalgia Critic and Extra Credits). Comparing free videos to one with such a large budget from a kickstarter specifically aimed toward those videos isn't exactly fair - I don't think anyone thought it would take over a year to see the fruit of their donations. At least let the public know when they can expect the release of the videos.

Edited April 2, 2013 by Gario

[zircon]

How is it "troublesome"? The vast majority of internet video creators I can think of don't give a timeline for their videos and many of them just release whenever they want. They're not obligated to work on any schedule but their own. Again it's been less than one month. Are you really so spoiled by free content (that I'm sure none of the critics here donated to) that you DEMAND a release timetable?

By the way with regards to the stupid comments about money, her website has 0 ads and as far as I can tell, from any browser, this video is not being monetized with YouTube preroll ads or popups of any kind. She's not using affiliate links, not selling some promoted product (like many channels do, ie. Epic Meal Time), etc. That kind of shoots down the theory that she's just shooting for YouTube ad money. However, even if she WERE doing that, again, why the hell does it matter? Virtually ALL internet video creators do EXACTLY that, so why not demonize Spoony, AVGN, the Escapist, Extra Credits, etc etc etc?

[Gario]

I think we ninja'd each other, there.

The difference between the other video people (who make their videos for sponsor money) and hers (who made her money from the people's own money) is precisely where the money came from, for the consumer. If you paid for it, then yeah, you expect people to at least be courteous about it and extend at least a word to let the audience know s/he's still working on it.

I'll patiently wait for her next video - she can take her time if she wants to. It would be a gesture in good faith if she let her public know when they would come out. See, before the video was released she would send an e-mail every so often to express her progress on her series to her supporters, and express her gratitude on the project. Now that the first is released, nothing. No mention of progress, no hint that it's around the corner. It's not only an issue of slow release, but also an issue of dropping the public relations ball when she started to get things rolling.

Even other video makers (AVGN, TGWTG, EC, etc.) keeps their audiences informed of video progress and/or delays, if it's applicable (AVGN let people know not to expect videos regularly due to the movie, TGWTG tells people about delays in production, as well as EC, etc.). I don't demand a time table, per se, but seeing that it's something that other video makers do for their audiences (even if it's just gestures stating that they're working on it or that there is a delay) it's something that's expected. It's actually a complaint I have against the ERB series too, when they have a larger than a month delay in their production, since they claim it's a monthly production.

Free, yeah, but they also get their money from the public viewing their material so video makers should a the very least respect the audience. Doug Walker (TGWTG) actually expresses a similar sentiment in this video, I believe, at about 8:00 on. It's not quite the same

Eh, people will get over it (it's a very mild annoyance for me, personally - I don't think about it save for when I see it in this thread), but it is rude to be silent with an expectant audience, especially those that contributed to it personally.

Edited April 2, 2013 by Gario

[zircon]

If you paid for it, then yeah, you expect people to at least be courteous about it and extend at least a word to let the audience know s/he's still working on it.

Yourself excluded, it seems like the only people complaining are people that didn't pay, and don't even like her material much. Would you fault me for taking 4+ months longer to release FF6 than I had originally planned? Surprisingly, almost nobody has complained about it, because they know it takes time for high-quality content, and the end result will be free to the world.

I think Anita is getting undue criticism of this for no reason other than that people don't like her personally. You have people like Arek repeatedly attacking her personally when no other video creator would get the same kind of treatment.

[The Derrit]

This is really, needlessly hostile, aggressive, and baseless. Nothing Anita has done merits this kind of accusation. There's literally 0 evidence for it whatsoever, so it only speaks to your own bias.

did you read my last long post? EVERYthing she has done merits this type of accusation.

Part 1: Puts out a needlessly inflammatory 'intro' video for her kickstarter and instead of routinely blocking comments as she normally does, leaves it open so people will be like 'why are you being such a bitch, you can just talk normally instead of being an asshole.'

Part 2: Uses those comments to do a TED talk on Internet harassment. Uses the free publicity and uninformed people who hear about her 'plight' to get money for her kickstarter. (note that in doing this she literally uses the trope she finds so disturbing, 'damsel in distress,' to her advantage.) Reading her public 'updates' on this, including this incredibly offensive and sexist picture that paints anyone who disagrees with her as a 'troll'

makes me sick. This part in particular I'm upset about. Is it okay to be manipulative and use shady and underhanded tactics if it's in the grand name of feminism? Shouldn't feminism be about why women should be treated equal, not using vices that no man could get away with to make her money? No man could take the same course of action on any inflammatory topic, and make money off of harassment. Nor would anyone jump to his defense. But if it's in the name of feminism, it's okay? I don't buy that.

Part 3: Uses stretch goals such as 'up the production quality,' despite there being no discernible difference between the production quality in this video compared to her priors.

Part 4: Uses a pledge $500 prize as A "DVD set of the entire Feminist Frequency video collection. PLUS all of the above!" with an estimated delivery date of December 2012. While not definitive, and clearly there is no reference to it now on the kickstarter site anymore (though i'm fairly certain there originally was,) that was the date the ENTIRE PROJECT was supposed to be finished.

Part 5: It's been 10 months since the kickstarter ended. A single video has been made. To take from the comments section of her kickstarter, "Please respond to my message regarding my refund request. This project is nearly half a year past its originally estimated due date. And no, "improved production quality" is not a valid reason to justify this project's tardiness. Thank you." and there are TONS of comments like this. On her Kickstarter page! I just looked! You can't just say 'nobody complained' when a large portion of the from-backer comments are complaints.

Part 6: She's given no one, not even her backers, a timeline for when these videos, or even just the NEXT video, will be finished.

What about any of this is defensible?

Would you fault me for taking 4+ months longer to release FF6 than I had originally planned?

No, because you would be reasonable and respectful towards your audience by, you know, informing them? Instead of saying 'well, guess I'll just say nothing while my self imposed deadline passes me by. They'll understand.' Seriously, if you were in her shoes, would you really give no public word to anyone regarding your project's tardiness and just expect it to be okay? Would you personally be okay with that? Of course not.

Also, other video creators get negative criticism ALL THE TIME. On par with this! If anything I would say the criticism towards her has been some of the more solid criticism leveled against an inflammatory creator in a good while once you get past the actual flamers. Anyone who's just like 'down with women' has been driven away by feminazis. The only people who have stuck around are people who are willing to put in the time to prove a point. And there are tons of them. For good reason. Because creating something of such poor quality and expecting it to stand up in the court of public criticism is frankly insulting, and I don't want people I know to see this and be influenced by it because a woman used big words to call things sexist.

She deserves the criticism she's getting. She used images and examples directly off of *cough* WIKIPEDIA AND TVTROPES.ORG??? Really? I guess all that money and time put into 'research' must have been really hard. That's not plagiarism or anything either.

Edited April 2, 2013 by The Derrit

[Brandon Strader]

Yourself excluded, it seems like the only people complaining are people that didn't pay, and don't even like her material much.

And they're mostly men, like in this thread. How silly of them!

Would you fault me for taking 4+ months longer to release FF6 than I had originally planned?

I'd fault sixto. Always fault sixto.

Surprisingly, almost nobody has complained about it, because they know it takes time for high-quality content, and the end result will be free to the world.

Depends on how you define complaining, and where you look. There's a lot of people who have been asking where it is.

I think Anita is getting undue criticism of this for no reason other than that people don't like her personally.

I doubt most of these people know her personally.

You have people like Arek repeatedly attacking her personally when no other video creator would get the same kind of treatment.

What do you mean 'people like Arek'?!

[Arek the Absolute]

disregard

Edited June 15, 2019 by Arek the Absolute
i was an idiot

[Bleck]

I think Anita is getting undue criticism of this for no reason other than that people don't like her personally.

while I think you're right, I also think that a lot of people are being unfairly defensive of her because they're afraid that if they do anything but support her than they must be sexist

yes, personally attacking her for lack of a better criticism

no, expecting her to actually make the fuckin' videos is not somehow unfair

yes, it is unreasonable to expect people to work to a schedule on free material

no, it's not unreasonable to expect people to work on material that they've been paid to work on

etc.

I think a lot of people shape their criticism and/or praise of this video around expectations that their social surroundings have regarding feminist topics, and I think people need to stop fuckin' doing that

to the people who didn't like the video; the video being shitty doesn't mean that you get a free pass to insult her or ignore the very real issue of sexism prevalent in video games and society at large, so stop being fuckin' dickheads

to the people who did like the video; just because sexism is prevalent and some of anita's points are valid doesn't mean that the video isn't shitty or that criticism of it is unwarranted, so stop being fuckin' pretentious

[Arek the Absolute]

disregard

Edited June 15, 2019 by Arek the Absolute
i was an idiot

[djpretzel]

I think it's important to distinguish between animosity/criticism that is commonly leveled at MANY kickstarters as opposed to actual criticism of the content itself. The former is incidental and I think attacking (OR defending) it doesn't really accomplish much, personally - my two cents. I still think she said quite a bit in her first video that has not been persuasively defended by those who apparently view it as without flaw or defect.

I pointed out more than a few examples at http://ocremix.org/forums/showpost.php?p=911230&postcount=658

But perhaps chief among them is:

"It's a sad fact that a large percentage of the world's population still clings to the deeply sexist belief that women as a group need to be sheltered, protected, and taken care of by men."

Empty, unqualified, condescending, and ignorant claims like this are not necessary to persuasively argue her point, and only serve to weaken both the perception of feminism and the reception of her overall thesis, which I (more or less) agree with. I'm worried that she's preaching to the choir and doesn't care at all about persuading those who might be skeptical of her ideas when she says things like this. I'd love for someone to stand up for this one, single sentence as being analytical, defensible, or anything other than pure dogma recitation... any takers?

Here's what I like to think she MEANT to say, and also what I believe:

"Human society continues to develop an understanding that any protective or submissive instincts between males and females are not incompatible with equal rights and treatment for both sexes, and that such equality is preferable. Unfortunately, this appreciation has not yet spread and influenced all cultures consistently, or any thoroughly."

There you go, I fixed it.

We're no longer dealing in the tired trade of false booleans, we're no longer pulling unfounded "facts" and unquantified "percentages" from thin air, we're no longer demonizing "sad" people who are "clinging" to something, we're no longer denying that there's at least a POTENTIAL instinctual/evolutionary motivation at play, etc. If you see the difference between these two statements, and see why my version is preferable, I respectfully request a high-five. You want something shorter and more colloquial? Okay, that's obviously not MY style, but how about...

"Sadly, the idea that women should always be sheltered, protected, and cared for by men remains prevalent."

That works, too. I mean, I still think it oversimplifies things, but it's truer to the original intent without involving faux-facts, black-and-white fallacies or condescension. I think "should always" is a key improvement over "need" because it's the universality of the assumption that's truly problematic. At this particular point in human history, or in a particular culture, women as a group may actually NEED to be protected by men. Because of... other men. It's the underlying assumption that this is always true, and how things should be, that is actually the issue. I know this is subtle and may seem like semantics, but I think it's quite key. Feminist dogma wants to emphasize the "need" because it sounds dismissive and condescending, whereas the general sentiment of wanting to protect, shelter, and take care of someone is potentially (even likely) coming from a positive place. Taken too far, however, it operates under a categorical assumption that it is accurate 100% of the time, that no legitimate alternatives exist, and furthermore it tends to diminish the capacity of the protected & sheltered in completely unrelated realms. However, you'll notice that THIS version of the statement doesn't sound so harsh... doesn't sound so objectionable, or inciting, or outrageous. It's a little bit harder to instantly & strongly agree with. I believe that's because it's a couple steps closer to the truth, and the truth is more subtle, but always worth taking the time to explore.

I think women should be talking analytically about the portrayal of females in games, and I think it should be done in a high-profile manner that gathers a lot more visibility, but I'm not at all convinced she's the right woman for the job. The only way she can do more harm than good is by making needlessly polarizing and oversimplifying statements like the one above. So far there are relatively few examples, but I do wonder why there need to be any...

Edited April 2, 2013 by djpretzel

[crypto_magnum]

I pointed out more than a few examples at http://ocremix.org/forums/showpost.php?p=911230&postcount=658

Wow... that post was eye-opening for me. This is the first truly thoughtful and persuasive criticism of Anita's work that I've come across (disclaimer: I haven't read most of this thread yet, so I'm not implying anything about the quality of the criticism contained within it thus far). I think that, because I'm part of the "choir" she's preaching to, most of these problematic phrases you dissected slipped right past me on my first viewing of Anita's video. When you already agree with the conclusions, it can be easy to overlook flaws or fill in the missing logical steps with your own outside knowledge, without even realizing you're doing it. I'm definitely guilty of that, in this case. And it stinks to have to admit that, because I think that Anita's message is an important one, and I agree emphatically with much of it.

I'm still impressed with and appreciative of what Anita has been able to do with her campaign so far. There's a lot of value to be had from that first video. I think it's powerful from an illustrative standpoint; while parts of the rhetoric and logic may be lacking, the onslaught of visual examples left a lasting impression on me. And I also think that the video is accomplishing a lot from an informative standpoint as well-- it's raising consciousness on these issues, as is evidenced by the large volume of posts being generated on OCRemix and other sites. Not that anyone is necessarily arguing otherwise, but I'd affirm that Anita is doing a positive thing. I think she's doing the best she can (she's certainly taking her time with the videos, which indicates to me that she's trying to be careful and thoughtful), and it's a heck of a lot better than I could do.

The only point I might challenge you on, then, is your skepticism as to whether Anita is the "right" person for the job. I'd put forth that she is the right person for the job, simply because she's the one who had the guts, motivation, and technical savvy to put together the first campaign of this scale surrounding this issue, which had previously been left alone (relatively) for decades. She's not the most studied, most articulate, most-anything... but she had the right combination of qualities and the right timing to get this ball rolling. Until someone better steps up to claim the torch and carry it forward, Anita is the right person for the job, because she's the only person.

I hope that with so many episodes left to write, some of the intelligent criticism such as DJP's will reach Anita and inspire her to make adjustments to her rhetoric, moving forward. We're just scratching the surface with this first video, so there's plenty of time for course correction.

[zircon]

Part 1: Puts out a needlessly inflammatory 'intro' video for her kickstarter and instead of routinely blocking comments as she normally does, leaves it open so people will be like 'why are you being such a bitch, you can just talk normally instead of being an asshole.'

I don't know the whole history for an absolute fact but I'm pretty sure that she started blocking comments AFTER her Kickstarter gained attention, not the other way around.

Part 2: Uses those comments to do a TED talk on Internet harassment. Uses the free publicity and uninformed people who hear about her 'plight' to get money for her kickstarter

This blows my mind. You're literally blaming the victim. You're saying she's the bad guy for having an opinion and putting it out there, and vilifying her instead of the people who sent death threats, called her a bitch, threatened to rape her, photoshopped her with porn, made games about beating her up, etc. People post way more 'inflammatory' things every day all over the internet. Almost nobody gets the sheer level of harassment that she did, and certainly nobody deserves to.

Also, again unless I am grossly misreading dates, you are GROSSLY wrong on the history. The Kickstarter ended WAY before her TED talk.

Regarding all the rewards, timeline, etc: this is the nature of Kickstarter. The MAJORITY of projects seem to not ship on time, especially when they're overfunded. This is true from personal experience and observation.

http://www.gottabemobile.com/2012/07/17/only-25-of-kickstarter-projects-ship-on-time/

Note some of the stats here. Only 25% of overfunded projects ship on time. After EIGHT MONTHS, 75% have shipped. Through my experience on Identity Sequence and FF6 I can confidently say that there is an incredible tendency to vastly underestimate the logistical requirements of physical rewards. Keep in mind Anita's original goal was $6000. The logistical difference between shipping for $6000 worth of backers and over 10x that is simply immense.

Bottom line - her post-funding Kickstarter performance is very much in line with many other overfunded projects. It is needlessly hostile to attack her personally for something that happens to pretty much everyone else.

Also, other video creators get negative criticism ALL THE TIME. On par with this!

I follow sites like Cinemassacre, Nostalgia Critic (tgwtg) and Spoony weekly if not daily. I've never seen the amount of criticism and vitriol for those creators as Anita has received for this.

Bro, what? Have you not seen what a lot of others are saying?

Again people like you (arek) and Brush are basically just making shit up about ad revenue, among other things. There are no ads on her site and no ads in the YT video, so she's not making money from that. And again even if she WERE, who cares? That would make her #10000001 among people creating videos on the internet for money.

General note: It makes no sense to accuse me of 'fanboyism' or being overly defensive. If you are accusing the video creator of "money-grabbing" or whatever else, the burden is on you to back up what you said (and again even if were true, as Bleck pointed out, it has no bearing on the video content - and even THAT has no bearing on discussion of the trope itself).

Edited April 3, 2013 by zircon

[Brandon Strader]

Reading her public 'updates' on this, including this incredibly offensive and sexist picture that paints anyone who disagrees with her as a 'troll'

makes me sick.

Wow. That's just tasteless.

[Brushfire]

Again people like you (arek) and Brush are basically just making shit up about ad revenue, among other things. There are no ads on her site and no ads in the YT video, so she's not making money from that. And again even if she WERE, who cares? That would make her #10000001 among people creating videos on the internet for money.

I made up something about ad revenue? It's pretty easy to see that she got 160K from her kickstarter, not her ad revenue.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/566429325/tropes-vs-women-in-video-games/posts/242547 <-- Proof that I am not making it up Andy.

[zircon]

Sorry, that was Dexie and Derrit, not you Brush. The claim that she's releasing slowly to make more money makes no sense because she's not monetizing the videos. And even if she were, again, who cares, since tons of other people do the same thing (etc). It's like saying game developers who raised $xx million can't try to sell their game because they Kickstarted it. Dumb and nonsensical on many levels.

[Brushfire]

Sorry, that was Dexie and Derrit, not you Brush. The claim that she's releasing slowly to make more money makes no sense because she's not monetizing the videos. And even if she were, again, who cares, since tons of other people do the same thing (etc). It's like saying game developers who raised $xx million can't try to sell their game because they Kickstarted it. Dumb and nonsensical on many levels.

We cool Bro.

[Brandon Strader]

She is going to be making assloads of money from DVD releases and printed "teaching" materials and that kind of junk. Makes you wonder if she licensed all the footage and content for the DVD release. If she did I could understand using the nearly $160k for that and sticking with regular quality videos.

[Dexie]

Sorry, that was Dexie and Derrit, not you Brush. The claim that she's releasing slowly to make more money makes no sense because she's not monetizing the videos. And even if she were, again, who cares, since tons of other people do the same thing (etc). It's like saying game developers who raised $xx million can't try to sell their game because they Kickstarted it. Dumb and nonsensical on many levels.

I didn't claim that, actually.