ATTENTION! WALL OF TEXT COMING. HOLD ON TO YOUR HATS. Or they're gonna fall.
As many of you know (and probably heard me talking about) Anita Sarkeesian is the self-proclaimed feminist from the YouTube channel Feminist Frequency https://www.youtube.com/user/feministfrequency who takes upon herself to explain tropes which are applied to female characters as if she is some kind of hardcore "feminist" version of TV Tropes. I was aware of her for a while now, but I never cared about what she was doing until she started a Kickstarted to do a series of videos on video games, which currently has 3 videos on the Damsel in Distress trope.
Like it wasn't enough that she is stealing game footage from let's plays and walkthroughs of others Youtubers (as shown here Vicsor's Opinion: Anita's Sources) she doesn't get what is going on in video games or why we feel attached to it or this isn't about a boy's club because more and more women play nor she understands that she is a troll bait with her lack of understanding.
She came to us, gamers, with a self entitled attitude saying that games aren't as she wishes and they should because she's woman and a feminist, but why is she wrong? What is doing wrong?
From a gamer point of view and even a human one, she doesn't understands feelings, she doesn't understand that she is the face of feminist to gamers and that gaming is just about playing and being good and/or enjoying.
In here series, she takes game scenes (like the ones on ICO, Dishonored, God of War and many other games) out of context and judges them as she best sees fit.
Let's look at her approach to Dishonored, which is a game I know pretty well.
This is the intro of the 2012 game Dishonored, a first person action game set in the fictional Empire of the Isles.
This is how much Anita shows of the intro:
In the game you play as Corvo Anatto, the Empress' personal bodyguard, and yes I said Empress. The Empire of the Isles has it's ruler a woman, the Empress Jessamine and next in line is her young daughter Emily.
The problem with Anita's interpretation and explanation of the games is that she sees Dishonored has a violent male power fantasy in which the Empress is killed, when in fact she's killed (and spoilers, sorry) because of a conspiracy made by the Royal Spymaster of the Empire. He contacted a man called Daud (the man in red) and his elite assassins to kill the Empress because he wanted to rule, he wanted power, he did not killed the Empress and kidnapped Emily because they're women, it's because they're POWERFUL, they're as politically powerful as a person can get. But Anita didn't play the game, she only saw the trailers, she probably didn't even read the Wikipedia page for the game or the game's Wiki, to know that the Empress was killed over power. Or maybe she knows and chose to ignore it for the sake for her argument (which honestly, I would be surprised).
To me, Dishonored, feels like a female power fantasy. Surely, most of characters are males and you play as a male, but as you play you'll notice that Corvo is manipulated by everyone, especially by women, into doing what they want him to do because of his emotional attachment to Emily. It's not only his duty and his honor that he is after (or his masculinity like Anita likes to say), he's after the only "family" he got left because he sees Emily as his daughter and to Emily Corvo is her father figure.
Each important women in the game represent some kind of power that women have/might have in game and/or in real life.
Let's see how this works:
Callista Curnow is the caretaker of the future Empress and teaches her what she needs to know to become an Empress, representing the so female power of Education.
Emily Kaldwin and her mother represent, of course, Political power.
Lady Boyle holds the Sexual power, especially Esma Boyle. All of the sisters bad expriences seem to go around sex and they seem to use it to hold power in a Victorian-like world. Like her, Madame Prudence holds Sexual power over men, though in a different way, being the owner of the Golden Cat, a brothel and bathhouse.
Grammy Rags the once beautiful Vera Moray held Sexual power over men in her youth (having men who wanted to marry her fight over her) and holds the power of Black Magic after meeting with a man with black eyes. Of course, she helds Magic power unlike any other man in the game does, being almost immortal.
Last but not least, is a character from the DLC Knife of Dunwall, Billie Lurk who is the second of the elite assassin group who killed the Empress. She holds Physical power, being one of the most powerful characters in game.
Anita ignores this by calling the game a male powered violent revenge fantasy in which a man goes after his daughter.
Where Anita truly fails is to understand that gaming is not only a bussiness but most of players are male and being male maybe having a male character lose their mother/wife/girlfriend/daughter is more effective to them than is losing their father. For a game to be well done (if it's not a mindless shooter) we have to feel for the characters and it is easy to feel for a female character, especially one that we need to protect and love like Emily is to Corvo and eventually the player.
This is where she really fails. She lack feelings. She doesn't understand what we feel for the characters or the story.
In her last video she was supposted to present reserved roles of this, but she presents nothing and keeps on talking about how video games are bad and going to attack indie games like Super Meat Boy! and Glish because of their simplistic save the girl plots and proving to have no sense of humour, so don't lose your time with that one.
Now that I'm over and done with, you're free to comment, bash me, say I'm right, kick me in the face, ignore me or whatever.
As many of you know (and probably heard me talking about) Anita Sarkeesian is the self-proclaimed feminist from the YouTube channel Feminist Frequency https://www.youtube.com/user/feministfrequency who takes upon herself to explain tropes which are applied to female characters as if she is some kind of hardcore "feminist" version of TV Tropes. I was aware of her for a while now, but I never cared about what she was doing until she started a Kickstarted to do a series of videos on video games, which currently has 3 videos on the Damsel in Distress trope.
Like it wasn't enough that she is stealing game footage from let's plays and walkthroughs of others Youtubers (as shown here Vicsor's Opinion: Anita's Sources) she doesn't get what is going on in video games or why we feel attached to it or this isn't about a boy's club because more and more women play nor she understands that she is a troll bait with her lack of understanding.
She came to us, gamers, with a self entitled attitude saying that games aren't as she wishes and they should because she's woman and a feminist, but why is she wrong? What is doing wrong?
From a gamer point of view and even a human one, she doesn't understands feelings, she doesn't understand that she is the face of feminist to gamers and that gaming is just about playing and being good and/or enjoying.
In here series, she takes game scenes (like the ones on ICO, Dishonored, God of War and many other games) out of context and judges them as she best sees fit.
Let's look at her approach to Dishonored, which is a game I know pretty well.
This is the intro of the 2012 game Dishonored, a first person action game set in the fictional Empire of the Isles.
This is how much Anita shows of the intro:
In the game you play as Corvo Anatto, the Empress' personal bodyguard, and yes I said Empress. The Empire of the Isles has it's ruler a woman, the Empress Jessamine and next in line is her young daughter Emily.
The problem with Anita's interpretation and explanation of the games is that she sees Dishonored has a violent male power fantasy in which the Empress is killed, when in fact she's killed (and spoilers, sorry) because of a conspiracy made by the Royal Spymaster of the Empire. He contacted a man called Daud (the man in red) and his elite assassins to kill the Empress because he wanted to rule, he wanted power, he did not killed the Empress and kidnapped Emily because they're women, it's because they're POWERFUL, they're as politically powerful as a person can get. But Anita didn't play the game, she only saw the trailers, she probably didn't even read the Wikipedia page for the game or the game's Wiki, to know that the Empress was killed over power. Or maybe she knows and chose to ignore it for the sake for her argument (which honestly, I would be surprised).
To me, Dishonored, feels like a female power fantasy. Surely, most of characters are males and you play as a male, but as you play you'll notice that Corvo is manipulated by everyone, especially by women, into doing what they want him to do because of his emotional attachment to Emily. It's not only his duty and his honor that he is after (or his masculinity like Anita likes to say), he's after the only "family" he got left because he sees Emily as his daughter and to Emily Corvo is her father figure.
Each important women in the game represent some kind of power that women have/might have in game and/or in real life.
Let's see how this works:
Callista Curnow is the caretaker of the future Empress and teaches her what she needs to know to become an Empress, representing the so female power of Education.
Emily Kaldwin and her mother represent, of course, Political power.
Lady Boyle holds the Sexual power, especially Esma Boyle. All of the sisters bad expriences seem to go around sex and they seem to use it to hold power in a Victorian-like world. Like her, Madame Prudence holds Sexual power over men, though in a different way, being the owner of the Golden Cat, a brothel and bathhouse.
Grammy Rags the once beautiful Vera Moray held Sexual power over men in her youth (having men who wanted to marry her fight over her) and holds the power of Black Magic after meeting with a man with black eyes. Of course, she helds Magic power unlike any other man in the game does, being almost immortal.
Last but not least, is a character from the DLC Knife of Dunwall, Billie Lurk who is the second of the elite assassin group who killed the Empress. She holds Physical power, being one of the most powerful characters in game.
Anita ignores this by calling the game a male powered violent revenge fantasy in which a man goes after his daughter.
Where Anita truly fails is to understand that gaming is not only a bussiness but most of players are male and being male maybe having a male character lose their mother/wife/girlfriend/daughter is more effective to them than is losing their father. For a game to be well done (if it's not a mindless shooter) we have to feel for the characters and it is easy to feel for a female character, especially one that we need to protect and love like Emily is to Corvo and eventually the player.
This is where she really fails. She lack feelings. She doesn't understand what we feel for the characters or the story.
In her last video she was supposted to present reserved roles of this, but she presents nothing and keeps on talking about how video games are bad and going to attack indie games like Super Meat Boy! and Glish because of their simplistic save the girl plots and proving to have no sense of humour, so don't lose your time with that one.
Now that I'm over and done with, you're free to comment, bash me, say I'm right, kick me in the face, ignore me or whatever.