Feminism reborn - It's not changed, it's just different

[SerMixalot]

If a girl is wearing a tank top, it's seen as okay to stare at her boobs and then make a comment on it and then the belief that this woman wouldn't be wearing such a thing if she DIDN'T want male attention, that she should feel COMPLIMENTED by a strange man telling her she has nice tits, that she doesn't have a sense of humour if she tells him to go fuck off.

while I agree totally with your post and agree that rape is both a horrible crime and under addressed in our society, I am interested by this comment. I believe the dynamics are more complicated than you present. Men are visually oriented (ie they respond to visual stimuli-I believe that is even genetic or true from an evolutionary perspective). Men seem hardwired to look at a female form with a degree of sexual attention. Certainly men must be and normally are, respectful in their attention to women's figures, obviously staring is disrespectful, aggressive, and inappropriate. However is a fact of sexuality. On the other side, women know this and will accentuate their forms and beauty for attention. That is normal and healthy-with each individual deciding their own limits of expression. As for the final point, I don't think men are condemned for rejecting an advance even obnoxiously expressed. Because what the woman is rejecting is an effort a flirtation, to attract notice from the woman. That flirtation runs a whole gamut from the sweet and subtle to the obnoxious and loud. One never knows what will work or won't work. Certainly the cat call at the random woman is obnoxious and unlikely to succeed but does fall into the realm of attention seeking flirtation. And I don't believe that the last example of a woman being told she has nice tits, tells the guy to fuck off is valid. I believe that scenario would result in support for the woman, by the vast majority of men and women.

[Lyanna Stark]

You may not like the stereotype that each gender has types of game that they deviate to, doesn't mean that its not true or that women can enjoy playing as you put it FPS its just out of those type of games men are a majority, which I would hazard a guess is due to the competitive nature of shooters or rts etc and while recent studies have shown that competitiveness isn't tied to to any one gender males are more likey to adhere to that trait or take the option of competeting.

This view stems from the assumption that the underlying reason women generally prefer other games than FPS games is that women, by their (our) nature, is less competitive and that this is somehow inborn, genetic, natural. If this position is taken, then yes, obviously FPS games will forever cater to men and men only as the main group.

However, there are several problems with this view point. For one, there are few proofs that women are genetically/naturally/born in such a fashion as to make us disinclined to competitiveness to such a degree that we cannot enjoy FPS games (single player or online).

Further, as a woman who used to play FPS games, I can testify that I gained access to people who had these games and could recommend me FPS games by having a boyfriend who was a gamer, and through him other male friends who were also gamers. I can also mention that even if I was encouraged to try out FPS gamers, nobody ever even considered that I might be a good enough player to be accepted into one of their clans (Quake, Unreal Tournament, Counter Strike, etc). That was a male only club and I was viewd as a novelty.

I had female friends who showed interest in FPS games, but as they had even less contact with a social context in which FPS games were a. common b. accepted and c. part of a social network, they had even less inclination to spend lots of time and effort on learning it.

What we did was play other games instead (remember: this was in the late 90s/early 00s), normally console games or that we simply gathered around one computer and made a communal effort at FPS.

So I'd state that from my point of view as a female gamers, and as someone who has spent time around a. other female gamers b. women who could have become serious gamers or c. women who were gamers but for various reasons didn't play much, lack of competitiveness has very little to do with women which games women prefer, and far more to do with what is socially accepted, what you get recommended through you circle of friends and also if you get included in a social context.

I really don't get how the sexualisation of both genders in video games (Or are we really believing that the big muscular chiseled male is the norm) automatically leads to the disempowerment of women or that its going to lead to that character being objectified. Whats missing is what background and defining traits that character has, and not jumping straight to the conclusion that the character is a 2d model for the other gender to gawp at.

As Eefa said, the male characters are normally male power fantasies while the women are often portrayed in a sexualised fashion or as damsels in distress/disempowered.

The rest is just marketing, the thing that just doesn't care at all gender issues. You appeal to the core base of that game type as the cost of games just doesn't make riskier idea feasible and if that core base happens to be more male oriented then you go for the traits that appeal to them.

Hence I restate my question from above: is sexualising women, objectifying women and disempowering women something male gamers, as a group, crave to enjoy their games? Why are these things needed for male gamers to enjoy a game?

Until we see the gender ratios in type of games start to equalise, you have all the justification in the world to develop and write for the section of the gaming industry that you work in as capitalism and marketing just doesn't care.

With the games written the way they are, that is unlikely. Especially with online games where you encounter massive amounts of sexism, racism and homophobia and the game companies themselves can't be bothered to do anything about it. Why would women enter environments that are, by their very nature, pretty hostile? Until game developers and game companies start developing games that can cater to both women and men, or at least consider why women actively avoid certain games, they won't get the money from gaming women either.

Games like Mass Effect and Dragon Age for instance have huge amounts of female players. Going by their forums, I'd say 50% are female. The same is true of Fantasy readers: survey after survey show that women make up half or over half of the readership. Instead of ignoring women and pigeonholing women as "SIM players" or "Hello Kitty adventureland" players, developers can try and actually create RPGs, FPS games etc. that don't just cater to men, but to women too, and maybe then they'll find that women can play FPS or RPGs just as happily as men can.

Lastly, as a female gamer, I cannot emphasize enough that as a woman playing games online and single player, you hide it from your non-gaming friends and you hide it from other people online. It's not accepted in RL and online you run the very real risk of getting harassed.

EDIT: While out cycling with my daughter, it struck me that every single female gamer I know and know of got into gaming due to either boyfriends, male siblings or husbands. So social context and peer groups matter *a lot*.

[Edda van Heefmstra Ruston]

BIOTRUTHS

[Merentha]

BIOTRUTHS

This. Any time you find yourself saying "[men/women] are hardwired to [anything]" seriously consider if this is actually known to be hardwiring. It probably isn't.

[Edda van Heefmstra Ruston]

Even if it is, which is falsely claimed some absurd amount of time, it doesn't matter. Unless you're going to argue that men are also incapable of getting over their hardwiring (since this rarely seems to be used to excuse other genders' behaviours), something being 'hardwired' doesn't mean it's inevitable.

[Prosesskrift]

I think the Mass Effect series is an excellent example of Sarkeesian's point actually. Though you can play both genders, and that both play more or less the same (with the female choice having far superior voice acting), you still have the Asari and the agressive focus on the pixels of Miranda's ass.

Mentioned often as an example of a game that appeals to both genders, it's still quite active in its objectification of women.

[Lyanna Stark]

I think the Mass Effect series is an excellent example of Sarkeesian's point actually. Though you can play both genders, and that both play more or less the same (with the female choice having far superior voice acting), you still have the Asari and the agressive focus on the pixels of Miranda's ass.

Mentioned often as an example of a game that appeals to both genders, it's still quite active in its objectification of women.

Yep, hence my point that it is virtually impossible to find a game that doesn't to some degree make use of sexist tropes. :)

However, the Bioware games are often head and shoulders above the rest anyway and even if they do still make use of sexist tropes to a degree, they are still proof that women can definitely get into pretty complicated and demanding games and aren't forever doomed to occupying the "SIMs only" corner of game developers' minds.

Even if it is, which is falsely claimed some absurd amount of time, it doesn't matter. Unless you're going to argue that men are also incapable of getting over their hardwiring (since this rarely seems to be used to excuse other genders' behaviours), something being 'hardwired' doesn't mean it's inevitable.

:agree: 100%

[One More Gun]

Hence I restate my question from above: is sexualising women, objectifying women and disempowering women something male gamers, as a group, crave to enjoy their games? Why are these things needed for male gamers to enjoy a game?

No, looking at the top sellers for last year, or even all time I'd say they don't. Personally I don't see the problem being as vast as some would claim, but it does exist. Even then, it's a matter of how narrow an individual makes the guideposts for meeting the criteria of a game sexualising women, objectifying women, and disempowering women. Tomb Raider stands out to me because aside from Lara Croft's physical appearance she's a competent female lead who is very much empowered. Of course the sexuality of her design is pretty blunt and clearly geared towards young males. My question would be, what would she need to look like in order to pass the test? Or does Tomb Raider have other problems that evade my male sensibilities on this issue?

There's another problem which vexes me. If these aspects in videogames are a component to turning women away from certain titles, then why was Twilight so popular with women? The entire series is based around a disempowered female who always in need of rescue, whose sexuality was a driving force for couple unrealistic portrayals of the ideal man. 50 Shades of Grey (which started as Twilight fan fiction coincidentally), heads into similar territory. Both written by women, for women. The popularity of either one on its face would tell a video game developer that a game for women should include more disempowerment, sexuality, and objectification than one for men.

That's obviously not true, and not how it should be interpreted but I'm seeing a real contradiction. I'd like to hear a woman's take.

[Seli]

Even if it is, which is falsely claimed some absurd amount of time, it doesn't matter. Unless you're going to argue that men are also incapable of getting over their hardwiring (since this rarely seems to be used to excuse other genders' behaviours), something being 'hardwired' doesn't mean it's inevitable.

The 'but men are hardwired that way' excuse is actually used to control women and justify horrible behaviour by men (eg rape and sexual harassment). We should not accept it there, and we should not accept it in any other context. We are so much more complicated than that.

[Galactus]

However, the Bioware games are often head and shoulders above the rest anyway and even if they do still make use of sexist tropes to a degree, they are still proof that women can definitely get into pretty complicated and demanding games and aren't forever doomed to occupying the "SIMs only" corner of game developers' minds.

I think Bioware has to some extent gotten around this by pandering in a similar way to girls. So rather than actually not objectify women they throw in a couple of shirtless angsty men to distract people, while not actually changing anything. (It's still fun though)

EDIT: Speaking of which, damsel in distress, I do remember both Baldur's Gate II and SWTOR has "rescue the love interest" subplots that simply slots in the approporiate character, regardless of gender.

[Theda Baratheon]

Yeah, I always liked that about Baldur's Gate II

[straits]

There's another problem which vexes me. If these aspects in videogames are a component to turning women away from certain titles, then why was Twilight so popular with women? The entire series is based around a disempowered female who always in need of rescue, whose sexuality was a driving force for couple unrealistic portrayals of the ideal man. 50 Shades of Grey (which started as Twilight fan fiction coincidentally), heads into similar territory. Both written by women, for women. The popularity of either one on its face would tell a video game developer that a game for women should include more disempowerment, sexuality, and objectification than one for men.

I like the Oatmeal's take on Twilight and why it's popular.

[karaddin]

Ok I've got some other links to post getting back to more of a core feminism, but also stuff to contribute on the Women and Minorities in Geek Culture conversation so I've split off a new version of that thread, please take the video games etc discussion there. If mods can clean this up by moving the posts there and deleting my huge chunk of quotes then please by all means do so :)

[karaddin]

I don't think there has been much if any mention of it on the borad so far, but the week before last was a pretty extraordinary week for exposing sexism in Australian society. It was essentially a boil over of everything that's been simmering for the last 3 years since we got our first female PM and the relentless sexist attacks on her, I'm not going to go into the history beyond this particular week as Brook was thinking of doing a more detailed post on it (*nudge* *nudge*), so here are a couple of links giving a decent slice of what went on.

To summarise Julia Gillard kicked things off in a speech to a "Women for Gillard" event that no press were at. I think it's fair to say that the selective release of a couple of grabs of the speech were a misstep, as although her points were valid and apparently the speech as a whole was good, the snippets released come across as cynical political plays that claim women will be silenced if the conservative party are elected, and that abortion will be back on the agenda in that case as well. I think there is actually plenty of merit to the former claim, as both at the party level and the cabinet level there is a major difference in the number of women in the Labor (left wing) party vs the Liberal (right wing) party. This backfired, before the country seemed determined to do it's best to prove that sexism is indeed a major issue in Australia, and in particular the PM has been targetted by sexist attacks. First came a menu from a Liberal Party fundraiser that poked fun at Labor politicians with each dish, and the Julia Gillard quail has "small breasts, large thighs and a big red box". A radio shock jock from Perth then accused the PM on air of being a beard for her partner. The Australian soccer coach said that women should shut up in public. There was another scandal in the Australian Defense Forces (although the head of the army coming out and talking about it has been very impressive and showcases how men can be feminists).

Basically by the end of the week I'm not sure how it's possible to be remotely open minded and deny that sexism is a problem in this country.

Then a poll came out on the Monday of the following week showing that support amongst men in Australia had dropped another 7 or 8% to 27% for the PM. Apparently men here don't like to be called out on their sexism.

Now for a couple of international points. I was feeling pretty down on my country after all of the above, then I got linked this piece written by a seemingly intelligent and articulate 17 year old in the UK who decided to start a feminist society at her all girls school and has along with her friends faced major sexualisation, objectification and abuse for this. Now I'm just down on the progress I thought the west as a whole had made.

And finally a piece on the sexual violence against teen boys in the US as part of "hazing" amongst other things which is another wonderful example of rape culture in action, this time against boys (as noted upthread - rape culture hurts victims, male and female) and is a perfect example of the kind of issue that should be uniting feminists and MRAs.

ETA: Forgot this article was more feminist than trans in subject and belongs in here too: talking about how radical feminists that attack trans* people really don't get it and how it undermines their end goal.

[Guest Raidne]

ETA: Forgot this article was more feminist than trans in subject and belongs in here too: talking about how radical feminists that attack trans* people really don't get it and how it undermines their end goal.

I love articles like this, thanks! I really don't want to reduce transgendered people to the analysis they allow for, but I also can't help commenting on how much clearer it makes everything.

(1) A person with a vagina does not have to identify as feminine, or at the ends of that spectrum, as a woman

(2) People who identify as women should not be discriminated against for being women

Possibly these are absolutely two different things? I'm really not convinced that I ever fully got that point before in the same way - the potential to absolutely theoretically separate those two facets of sex and gender.

The problem, however, with that theoretical conception is that many women want to identify as women, but don't want to identify as "feminine"

(Plenty of women - and men - do want to identify as feminine, which is totally A-OK too - I just bought Kevin AuCoin's Making Faces, and it taught me more about strong femininity than I think I could have learned elsewhere).

But the whole women who want to identify as 100% without identifying as 100% is problematic unless the concept of woman - man as equivalent to feminine - masculine is misguided and there is really some other non-sex derived understanding of these concepts out there somewhere?

On the other side, women know this and will accentuate their forms and beauty for attention.

This is where you are wrong plenty of the time.

Many, many times I have seen women dressed to kill, and with a not insignificant degree of sex appeal, become very, very uncomfortable when they became aware of the amount and type of male attention they were getting. My hypothesis? Women often look the way they do for reasons of within-gender status. The degree of male attention they are able to drum up if necessary may be a factor in this, but a lot of women are primarily motivated by trying to look better than each other. I am, I am truly said to say, apparently not above this at this particular moment in my life, because I just bought a bright red pencil skirt that I will be wearing to the office tomorrow when I will be forced to be in the same room with Alpha Mean Girl and Beta Mean Girl for an hour, and I can't think of what else really would have been my motivation there. Most of time, I'm better than this, but there it is.

In any case, it has nothing to do with the losers who I suppose I am inviting to look at my ass all day; that's just a terribly unfortunate side effect.

(This is all much more straightforward for the more fashion-forward types who aren't all provincial and forever midwestern such as myself, as these people regularly manage to dress to impress without looking like they want to hear about your new haircut. I am thinking of the Man Repeller blog here, and also my sister to some extent.)

So, let's try this out - next time you think a woman wants male attention, is she looking at you? Are there other women around? Is she looking at them? Is she with a group of women and are they interacting with each other? Again, is anyone looking at you? If not, nobody cares what your opinions on their breasts are, I assure you.

[Lyanna Stark]

One More Gun,

I'll attempt to answer some of your points in the other thread karaddin created. Just trying to get some time for it. :)

I like the Oatmeal's take on Twilight and why it's popular.

That's kinda offensive actually, since

a. it imples 13 year old girls are brainless idiots who're good for nothing

b. anyone who likes it who's not a 13 year old girl is either gay or hasn't changed from the 13 year old girl stage

Twilight is also such an easy target because it is truly and utterly shite, and people like it, yet nobody thinks to lament lots of the crap culture young men take in. OMG Twilight is sexist bollocks. Yes? So are a huge amount of movies, comics and video games. Why should women in general, and 13 year old girls in particular, be immune to what society is pandering to them while young men are allowed to do whatever without scorn?

So, let's try this out - next time you think a woman wants male attention, is she looking at you? Are there other women around? Is she looking at them? Is she with a group of women and are they interacting with each other? Again, is anyone looking at you? If not, nobody cares what your opinions on their breasts are, I assure you.

Indeed. Sometimes being dressed to the teeth is simply something that is done to boost self confidence before a tricky meeting, for instance.

[karaddin]

I love articles like this, thanks! I really don't want to reduce transgendered people to the analysis they allow for, but I also can't help commenting on how much clearer it makes everything.

Try being one and then biting your tongue from all the insights you feel you have from having walked both sides of that line :P I just want to claim to be an authority and lay it down for people to learn from!

(1) A person with a vagina does not have to identify as feminine, or at the ends of that spectrum, as a woman

(2) People who identify as women should not be discriminated against for being women

Possibly these are absolutely two different things? I'm really not convinced that I ever fully got that point before in the same way - the potential to absolutely theoretically separate those two facets of sex and gender.

Absolutely, these two things are disconnected. I feel an extension of (1) is that someone does not need a vagina to identify as feminine or a woman. And identifying as either of these two things does not require identifying as the other.

The problem, however, with that theoretical conception is that many women want to identify as women, but don't want to identify as "feminine"

(Plenty of women - and men - do want to identify as feminine, which is totally A-OK too - I just bought Kevin AuCoin's Making Faces, and it taught me more about strong femininity than I think I could have learned elsewhere).

But the whole women who want to identify as 100% without identifying as 100% is problematic unless the concept of woman - man as equivalent to feminine - masculine is misguided and there is really some other non-sex derived understanding of these concepts out there somewhere?

I'm not quite sure exactly what you are getting at with this last bit, would you mind clarifying? That said, I'm pretty sure if this is where you are thinking you would really get a lot out of Whipping Girl by Julia Serano so I'm going to plug that again :P As it really delves into these issues.

Many, many times I have seen women dressed to kill, and with a not insignificant degree of sex appeal, become very, very uncomfortable when they became aware of the amount and type of male attention they were getting. My hypothesis? Women often look the way they do for reasons of within-gender status. The degree of male attention they are able to drum up if necessary may be a factor in this, but a lot of women are primarily motivated by trying to look better than each other. I am, I am truly said to say, apparently not above this at this particular moment in my life, because I just bought a bright red pencil skirt that I will be wearing to the office tomorrow when I will be forced to be in the same room with Alpha Mean Girl and Beta Mean Girl for an hour, and I can't think of what else really would have been my motivation there. Most of time, I'm better than this, but there it is.

<snip>

Not to mention that even if the appearance is intended to garner sexual interest, it's still heteronormative to assume it's attention from men that's wanted. I can promise you that looking good and sexy can be important to me and I NEVER want attention from a man. I've actually got issues with men/masculinity in the abstract (although not with individuals that I know), but it doesn't interfere with my politics or my recognition that men have plenty of room for improvement in certain facets of society as well.

Finally another blog to link, similar to the one from Min's ex-husband about the bloggers past misogynistic views.

[The Iceman of the North]

But the whole women who want to identify as 100% without identifying as 100% is problematic unless the concept of woman - man as equivalent to feminine - masculine is misguided and there is really some other non-sex derived understanding of these concepts out there somewhere?

You appeared to have left out a couple of important words here. 100% what?

[Seli]

You appeared to have left out a couple of important words here. 100% what?

gender? woman?

It is the Kinsey scale in a gender context rather than the attraction context.

[straits]

That's kinda offensive actually, since

a. it imples 13 year old girls are brainless idiots who're good for nothing

b. anyone who likes it who's not a 13 year old girl is either gay or hasn't changed from the 13 year old girl stage

I should have clarified I liked Matt's take on Twilight because of the cheap laughs to be found in the piece. You are of course free to take the worst possible implication from the article.

Twilight is also such an easy target because it is truly and utterly shite, and people like it, yet nobody thinks to lament lots of the crap culture young men take in. OMG Twilight is sexist bollocks. Yes? So are a huge amount of movies, comics and video games.

The fact that 'there are also other similarly crap things' doesn't make Twilight better or worse. Feel free to be the one who laments whatever crap media boys are offered and subjected to, since according to you nobody does so. And I believe this now belongs in the geek culture thread.

Why should women in general, and 13 year old girls in particular, be immune to what society is pandering to them while young men are allowed to do whatever without scorn?

I'm not going to judge anyone's choice of book. It does not have to be a 'guilty' pleasure. Not even Pants.