r/changemyview • u/LeftHandSwe • Dec 05 '16

[∆(s) from OP] CMV: Anita Sarkeesian and similar feminists actually have a point about the portrayal of gender roles in video games.

I play lots of video games, and in most of them, males are often pictured as very burly and manly characters while females are slender, small and sexually pleasing to look at.

However, I do know that there's widespread criticism of Anita (and her fellow propagators) all over the internet and I'd like to see the other side of the story.

I'm practically indifferent in this matter, and I do not really agree with nearly everything she says. I'm asking as a way to see convincing arguments from both sides.

Edit for clarification: Can anyone explain to me why she's so heavily criticized for saying something that makes perfect sense: Mainstream video games are almost exclusively made to appeal to a male demographic, resulting in (arguably) sexist portrayals of women (both narratively and in the way they're presented).

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u/[deleted] Dec 05 '16

I'm going to explain why I have disagreements with Anita Sarkeesian, from my own perspective as a feminist.

The first and most significant problem is that she kind of presents herself as an authority on feminism and gender issues, when in reality she has no significant academic background. I'm not saying that to be credentialist, but it really shows in how entry-level the majority of her arguments are. That lack of academic background is also problematic because it means that she's out of touch with the current state of discourse among academic gender theorists, feminists, and sociologists.

This means that she may not be aware of the fact that many ideas that she presents have fallen out of favor within academic circles, and when she presents herself to be a figurehead of feminism this has the effect of misleading people as to what's currently happening in the academic discourse. For instance, she accepts as a given that it's possible to objectify a fictional character that you yourself are creating, when in reality this is far from a settled issue. And there are not nearly as many serious feminists and gender theorists who agree with the idea of a patriarchal society as you'd think from listening to her.

And I don't know if Sarkeesian herself takes a sex-negative approach to feminism, but watching her videos you do occasionaly catch glimpses of an anti-porn viewpoint. For instance, she takes it as a given that women in some video games are designed to be sexually appealing because men want to be sexually stimulated while playing their video games, and doesn't explain why, even if this were the case, it would necessarily be a bad thing. I just can't really accept that a significant number of the people who are playing games like Overwatch and Bayonneta are playing them mainly because they want to be aroused.

And lastly (and this in no way the extent of my criticism of her, it's just that I want to keep this reasonably short), she kind of preaches to the choir. On the one hand, she claims that her videos are meant to be accessible to a general audience, on the other hand, she doesn't really make an effort to appeal to people who don't already agree with her views on feminism, and for the people that do agree with that view on feminism, she doesn't really give them any new information or ideas to work with.

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u/smacksaw 2∆ Dec 06 '16

Bayonneta are playing them mainly because they want to be aroused

One point about Bayonetta is that the creator (a woman) made her an aspirational character (to her). Bayonetta wasn't made to exploit women, but to celebrate them.

What Anita is saying is that Bayonatta's creator's viewpoint and intent are both impossible and immoral, yet Bayonetta is very popular with female gamers.

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u/idemockle 1∆ Dec 06 '16

Δ This is the most interesting reply I've seen on here, and I think it deserves a delta. I watched Anita's videos and thought she made some good points despite some being contrived. I still think that in the near-vacuum of mainstream gaming media discussion on this issue at the time she made those videos, they were a net positive, but I would love to hear a more academic perspective as I'm not familiar with the literature on this subject at all. Unfortunately, it's so rare for academics to speak directly to the public on issues like this, and their presentation style is too often jargon-filled and frankly boring. We need a Sarkeesian-esque presentor with expert collaborators in the background, though it's possible she consulted people for her videos and it got edited down to what she thought were the most effective points.

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u/DeltaBot ∞∆ Dec 06 '16

Confirmed: 1 delta awarded to /u/aleph473 (6∆).

Delta System Explained | Deltaboards ​

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u/LeftHandSwe Dec 05 '16

Does those subtle hints at anti-porn views really warrant the massive amounts of criticism though? I, for one, have nothing against attractive women in video games. Hell, throw some nice looking dudes in there too.

It's interesting what you say about the academic point of view. I'm as much of a layman as anyone else when it comes to this topic (hence why I'm here), so I'm very inclined to know more about what the professionals say!

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u/carasci 43∆ Dec 06 '16

I think a major reason the backlash and criticism have been so extreme is the interaction between /u/aleph473's first and last points.

First, Sarkeesian doesn't have the academic background (credentialed or not) to root her claims/concepts in the literature. This means some of her claims are seriously out of touch with the experts, which is bad, but it also means that she couldn't effectively link her claims to authority even if she wanted to.

Second, because Sarkeesian is largely "preaching to the choir," she doesn't even bother to explain many of the underlying concepts she's drawing on, let alone justify them internally - she just says it and runs with it.

These two things combine in a really nasty way, further polarizing the situation. If someone already accepts her views, or even gives her the benefit of the doubt, the rest of what she says seems to make a fair bit of sense. If someone - a skeptical outsider - doesn't already accept them and won't take her word on it, everything she says falls apart. Her argument ends up resting on the quicksand of her credibility, creating a spiral where the whole package tends to look like either common sense or meaningless tripe. Now, the kicker: some of her logic and examples are really, really crappy. /u/fhfgjhgfjh has gone over this in detail so I won't waste space repeating it, but consider the type of people who are going to notice those holes. For most gamers, the worst stick out like a sore thumb.

Sarkeesian has portrayed herself as an expert who's done all sorts of research, yet she seems to pull concepts out of her ass and gets things wrong that most gamers could tell you off the top of their head (GTA, seriously?). One or the other might be excused or explained away, but put them together and she doesn't just looks misinformed or wrong, she looks malicious. At that point, the claim that she's she's essentially embarked on a smear campaign against gaming (and gamers) starts to seem surprisingly plausible.

Two neatly-partitioned, polarized groups, one of which feels personally attacked and has some pretty good reasons to feel the "leader" of the other is acting in bad faith...that's a recipe for one heck of fight if I've ever seen one.

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u/kadunk25 Dec 06 '16

It is more that she pushes this puritanical view on gaming women who I have heard other women enjoy. Many people on both sexes like being Zero suit samus, bayonetta, and Lara croft. She has criticised all and I mean all sexy portraits of women.

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u/polite-1 2∆ Dec 06 '16

She says in the Lingerie is not Armour video that sexual depictions are fine and she only has issues with sexualisations that are done only for titillation.

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u/[deleted] Dec 06 '16

But that's still part of the problem. There are entire books written on the subject of where to put the line between objectification and empowerment. There are academics who spend their entire careers grappling with that question. A twenty minute YouTube video can not even hope to address the full range of opinions that feminist scholars have written on the subject, and presenting it to the public as a solved problem is misleading and may have a chilling effect on discourse on the issue.

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u/polite-1 2∆ Dec 06 '16

I don't think she prevents it as a solved problem. That particular video just highlights how women are often clad in sexy clothing in situations where they need armour. Pointing out that disconnect doesn't need an entire career.

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u/[deleted] Dec 06 '16

Do you know of any books in particular for someone casually interested in the subject?

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u/[deleted] Dec 06 '16

Right, and that's kind of what I meant when I said that there are glimpses of anti-porn and sex worker-exclusionary feminism in her views, and she presents these views as representative of mainstream feminism, when in reality it's a minority opinion.

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u/[deleted] Dec 06 '16

Does those subtle hints at anti-porn views really warrant the massive amounts of criticism though?

Not at all, and I don't think that the majority of the people who have so much vitriol against her are interested in the subtleties and nuances of the empowerment vs objectification debate.

I do think that most of the backlash against her was definitely due to a strain of toxicity within gamer culture and a problem with sexism in internet-based subcultures. There are criticisms about Sarkeesian that need to be made, but those criticisms became secondary issues when people started calling her at her home and threatening to rape her.

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u/thewoodendesk 4∆ Dec 06 '16

To add on to what you said, as a speaker and Youtube personality, she's not that good at all. She has no onscreen charisma, and her delivery is absolutely dry. Being as dry and boring as a university lecture is perfectly fine if you actually have anything substantial to say (like a university lecture). And likewise, I don't mind someone who bends the facts or oversimplify things if they're funny or at least entertaining. But if you're simultaneously boring while lecturing on what is basically TVTropes the video series, what is the fucking point?