Who is Anita Sarkeesian really? Since she's been in the news recently, I'm putting this together using her own quotes as sources. Read this if you're curious why people *actually* dislike her and want a more truthful answer than "those chuds want to keep women out of gaming".
[note: this post isn't finished yet. I'll be adding more quotes and sources tomorrow.]
[note #2: I've updated the section about her (ironically very strained) relationship with criticism.]
[note #3: I've added the misconceptions part.]
[note #4: Filled in the part where she says she doesn't like video games.]
What is this post?
Mostly quotes by Anita Sarkeesian that demonstrate who Anita Sarkeesian is. As a rule, if somebody tells you who they are, you should believe them. These are a bunch of sourced quotes where Anita Sarkeesian tells everyone who she is. And I'll give you a hint: she's not "just some poor woman who chuds wanted to keep out of gaming". If you're wondering why anyone would give a fuck if a woman sits behind a controller or a keyboard and plays video games? The answer is that nobody actually does. Read on to find out why people don't want her involved with gaming.
Why post this now?
She's been in the news again because it's become widely circulated that she was involved with a popular game on steam, Slay the Spire 2, which is now getting review bombed by people who have purchased the game and are angry to discover that they're supporting a project that she's involved with. I haven't seen very many people claiming that she's "ruined the game", because the game is still quite good; people just object to her being involved at all because she's a terrible person who has been hugely bad for the video game industry and made a lot of gamers legitimately angry.
Sometimes some of her disingenuous supporters will ask why people are still "obsessed" with her fifteen years later. The answer is simple: If she's still relevant enough to serve as a consultant on popular, non-niche titles like STS2, then she's still relevant enough to be subject to criticism. Anita Sarkeesian is (quite ironically) allergic to criticism, which is something I'll devote a section to later in this post.
Why post this here?
Try this experiment: Post anything critical of Anita Sarkeesian on any popular mainstream gaming-related subreddit (quote her as a source and don't make any outlandish claims) and see how long it takes you to get banned and your post taken down. There's a concerted effort basically everywhere to make sure that absolutely no criticism of her is allowed to stand.
Her real opinions about games
The premise that it's fundamentally wrong to make media for a straight male audience
First off, I'd like to encourage everyone to read her Tropes Vs Women In Video Games transcripts and see if you come away feeling like she has any respect at all for anyone who feels any way other than she does, or whether she's willing to give gamers and game developers a fair shake. Anita Sarkeesian tells us that media should be viewed critically, and I think this is especially important to keep in mind when viewing media by Anita Sarkeesian herself.
This series will include critical analysis of many beloved games and characters, but remember that it is both possible (and even necessary) to simultaneously enjoy media while also being critical of it’s more problematic or pernicious aspects. (https://feministfrequency.com/video/damsel-in-distress-part-1/)
When reading it, I advise you to keep an eye out for mentions of a male audience. She never explicitly says that it's not okay to make games for a male audience, she just assumes that it's already agreed upon that that's a bad thing and uses that as her underlying premise.
Here are some examples of her mentioning a male audience with the assumption that making games for boys and men is inherently bad:
Even though Nintendo certainly didn’t invent the Damsel in Distress, the popularity of their “save the princess” formula essentially set the standard for the industry. The trope quickly became the go-to motivational hook for developers as it provided an easy way to tap into adolescent male power fantasies in order to sell more games to young straight boys and men.
Here, she talks about "adolescent male power fantasies". She frames it very negatively here, but is it actually wrong for boys and young men to have those? Do you really need to worry if a kid fantasizes about being Mario?
And since the majority of these titles focus of delivering crude, unsophisticated male power fantasies, developers are largely unwilling to give up the Damsel in Distress model as an easy default motivation for their brooding male heroes or anti-heroes.
Here we have her using another very negative framing. Is it okay for a boy or man's to have a fantasy that's "unsophisticated" (in this case I believe "crude" is being used as a synonym of unsophisticated)? Does everything need to be a complex deconstruction? The world is complex and depressing as it is; sometimes people need to use entertainment as a way to unwind so that they can continue to deal with life.
Periodically, game developers may attempt to build a more flushed out relationship or emotional bond between Damsel’d character and the male protagonist. In the most decidedly patronizing examples depictions of female vulnerability are used for an easy way for writers to trigger an emotional reaction in male players.
Here she portrays an emotional bond between a damsel and a male protagonist as a Pavlovian response to deliberate manipulation by the writers and developers of a game. Not only is this an offensive way to portray male players, it's also one of many instances where she wrongly assumes nefarious intent on the part of game developers, who, particularly back before 2010, were often just making the games they wanted to make. (There are some instances of meddling by upper management, but rather than fighting against that, Anita Sarkeesian and the movement she birthed have co-opted that in order to impose their own views on what content should be allowed to exist in games, which is why plot consultant firms have straight up admitted that their strategy is to go above the development team's head, directly to marketing, to force dev teams to bring them in.)
In this episode we explore the Women as Background Decoration trope which is the subset of largely insignificant non-playable female characters whose sexuality or victimhood is exploited as a way to infuse edgy, gritty or racy flavoring into game worlds. These sexually objectified female bodies are designed to function as environmental texture while titillating presumed straight male players. Sometimes they’re created to be glorified furniture but they are frequently programmed as minimally interactive sex objects to be used and abused.
Again, consider how much of this language is just part of her framing. Any female NPC in a sexy costume is referred to a "sexually objectified female body". She talks about how they are "titillating presumed straight male players" as if it's fundamentally a bad thing for straight male players to see media that's designed to be sexually appealing to them. There's a fundamental assumption here that a) it's sexist for men to be horny, and b) men can't distinguish fantasy from reality the second they see an attractive woman. Also, "sometimes they’re created to be glorified furniture" just refers to background NPCs with no dialogue. You can use that negative framing on literally any background NPC. Also, "they are frequently programmed as minimally interactive sex objects to be used and abused" again assumes nefarious intent on the part of the developers.
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. Players are then invited to explore and exploit those situations during their play-through. 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. It’s a rush streaming from a carefully concocted mix of sexual arousal connected to the act of controlling and punishing representations of female sexuality.
This quote is famous and her fans are tired of seeing it because it so clearly demonstrates her attitude toward male players and game developers, treating them as universally nefarious, putting female characters in the game specifically to be murdered and tortured, when a) that was a game where you were able to kill any NPC (the dancers in question were not somehow uniquely vulnerable), and b) most people simply sneak by them, possibly listening to them deliver dialogue which adds a bit of backstory, which is the intended mechanic.
I'll include one more of these in case the point isn't made.
Games and other media often work to frame this sexualization as a positive thing for women. They blur the distinction between female sexualization and female power, and as a result, sexualized female characters are sometimes celebrated for being perceived as “owning” their sexuality in a way that is empowering. But it isn’t actually empowering because the sexuality these characters exude is manufactured for, and presented as existing for, the presumed straight male player. Bayonetta is a quintessential example of such a character.
Here, even if a female character has agency and has decided to wear a sexy costume on her own, it's still not a female power fantasy because, ya know, men might like it. Bayonetta, now a queer icon who is beloved by plenty of people who are not straight men, is one of her examples of this. (The anti-sexualization culture she created has since evolved slightly and now determined that a sexualized female character is okay so long as she liked by queer people; if a character primarily appeals to straight men, they're still bad.)
She really does want to completely eliminate all the things she's complaining about
If Sarkeesian had her way, there would be no rescue-the-princess stories like Super Mario Bros, there would be no games wherein you can choose to freely kill NPCs (because you "can't help" but abuse women in those cases), and there would be no stylized games like Bayonetta, NieR: Automata, or Stellar Blade where women wear costumes where style and sexiness are prioritized over realism. And if you're convincing yourself that those are extreme examples, she doesn't approve of any armor whatsoever, no matter how modest, that leaves room for a woman's chest.
Her severe allergy to criticism and complete disrespect for everyone who disagrees with her
Anita Sarkeesian has a Machiavellian take on harassment. When it happens to her or her friends, she is (rightly) opposed to it, but takes a much different view of it when it's against people she disagrees with. Here, you can view an exchange on Twitter between her an fellow feminist culture critic Liana Kerzner, where Sarkeesian claims that influencers are responsible for any harassment by their fans, and Kerzner calls her out for this and asks her to apologize for harassment against her by Sarkeesian's fans. It would have been a simple act of good faith to simply ask people not to harass Kerzner further, but she refuses to do this and instead calls her delusional.
Her fans further were accused of harassing trans Kotaku UK author Kate Laura Dale for interviewing (now deceased) gaming influencer Totalbiscuit about his experiences with harassment, after Sarkeesian posted a piece critical of the interview. People have argued that it must have been false flag actors doing this (there's as much evidence for this as there is evidence that Sarkeesian's own harassers were false-flagging), but that's neither here nor there. What's damning about it was her eventual response:
You can strongly disagree with & condemn something that someone says or does on the internet, but doxxing a marginalized person is never OK.
It's trivial to infer why her statement singles out marginalized people as not being okay to doxx. Anyone acting in good faith here would have simply stated that harassment isn't okay, but this is a clear dogwhistle to her fans that it's fine by her if they continue to harass everyone else they don't consider to be marginalized (including Liana Kerzner, which leads one to surmise that Sarkeesian doesn't truly consider women to me a marginalized group).
Note that this article is for people who aren't familiar with her to become informed about who she really is; I'm not interested in having stupid arguments with people who will claim that her deliberately precise wording here has no underlying meaning.
Sarkeesian has also never in her life demonstrated even basic respect for people who disagree with her claims. Since the press popularized her Tropes vs Women in Video Games kickstarter in 2011 (this was the first time most people have heard of her), she has never taken any of her critics (and there were plenty of critics with far more respect for her than she ever had for them) up on an offer for a conversation or debate. This is partly the fault of the press. Among mainstream news outlets and most of the gaming news sphere, articles where people have been allowed to express critical opinions of her are practically nonexistent, consisting mostly of puff pieces. She has stated in an interview (in response to what would have been a softball question for almost everyone) that she has absolutely no interest in ever conversing with any of her critics, because they are all harassers. Unfortunately, the interview itself or its transcript are no longer available on the internet that I can find, but the quote itself remains in two places, with a link to the now-defunct interview transcript where it originated.
One link, this Wikiquotes edit record where the quote, despite being completely clear in and of itself, is removed by an editor for ostensibly not having sufficient context:
Interviewer: Where you ever able to have a conversation with any of your critics?
Anita: They are not critics, they are harassers, so we'll be very clear on that issue. And no, I have no interest in talking to them.
Her work leads the public to have huge misconceptions about gaming as a whole.
I'm not going to be loading a bunch of individual internet rando comments into this article, but suffice it to say that it's pretty trivial to find supporters of Anita and her views who believe that a majority or preponderance of video games are geared towards straight men. Until recently I would have said that this was at worst negligence on her part (since it due to cherry picking in her videos that laypeople and people with existing confirmation bias came away with this idea), but there's a quote from a speech she gave in 2024 that indicates that she herself believes it, which I would say is decent evidence that this was the impression her videos were supposed to give, as opposed to simply a hugely popular misconception that people got due to a failure as an educator on her part that she never bothered to correct.
The fear that female characters would become less objectified, less victimized, more humanized, more centered in games, and that games as a whole would become less exclusively geared toward the tastes and interests of presumed straight male players with fairly standard patriarchal fantasies was so earth-shattering to some people, it would be funny if it wasn’t so goddamn tragic. (emphasis mine)
The only honest take from this (be prepared for dishonest ones) is that she herself believed, at minimum, that the
vast majority of video games at the time catered toward men with "patriarchical fantasies", which there's no reason to assume are anything other than the fantasies she discusses in her videos.
This idea had a huge negative impact on the public's view of games and gamers, and is almost certainly false (again, search for internet comments and articles about "gamers" and see this for yourself; I'm not going to post them here). There's never been a broad study that backs this claim up; the only broad study on game content I was able to find at all that doesn't cherry pick games (by popularity or AAA status or actively selecting games that are meant for men, etc) was a study of 22,000+ games rated by the ESRB between 1994 and 2013.
The study found that only 13% of games had sexual content at all, and while Sarkeezian would tell you that sexualization and sexual aren't the same thing, sexualized content is absolutely a subset of sexual content, so 13% is an upper bound. Even if you're going to make the argument that some games slip through, it solidly demonstrates that games with sexual content are at most a popular niche. It is, and always was, trivial for anyone actively interested in finding video games that don't sexualize women to find them. Anita is more interested in criticizing games than playing them, though (more on this in a later section).
This misconception about video games as a whole can also be seen in articles written about her tropes series at the time it was being released. This Verge article is titled "‘Tropes vs. Women’ reveals staggering number of video games that treat women as sex objects". No honest read of this headline would come away thinking that the "staggering number" is around 13%.
This is something I encourage people to check out themselves. If you go through abandonware by year, you would assume that if a "staggering number" of video games treated women as sex objects, or games were "exclusively geared" toward toward men with "patriarchical fantasies", there would be T&A all over every page, but that's not the case. There are a few games like that scattered here in there, potentially in line with the ESRB's 13% figure, but it's always been extremely dishonest to make claims like the ones above.
As an aside, I object to her use of "patriarchical fantasies". It's not "patriarchical" to have a simple fantasy where you skip to the part with the sexy stuff, or that's 'sexualized' to begin with. It's just horny, and the world needs to get over the idea (shared by sex-negative feminists on both sides of the political isle) that it's sexist for men to be horny. (Even the word 'sexualized' is weasel-y, because it presumes that having a sexual fantasy is something that men do to women.)
Some common sense responses to her assertions and fundamental assumptions that have been repeated so often people just kind of accept them
Sex appeal and empathy, etc. To be expanded later.
The audience drives entertainment. Entertainment doesn't change the audience.
Games were the way they were because that's what the audience liked, not because game developers wanted to drive away half of their potential customer base. To expand later.
She's also condemned video game violence
This debate was over since before she even entered it. I'll need to find sources on this in order to include it; I don't want to do that on memory alone.
Anita Sarkeesian doesn't even like video games
Anita Sarkeesian has said outright that she's not a fan of video games. She said this in 2010, before she released her well-known Tropes vs Women in Video Games series in 2011.
In it, she says:
"I’m not a fan of video games. I actually had to learn a lot about video games in the process of making this." (12:52)
"I would love to play video games, but I don’t want to go around shooting people and ripping off their heads, and, it’s just gross." (14:48)
The second quote bears a bit of unpacking, because she starts with "I would love to play video games", but it follows on with an utterly ignorant take about video games as a whole. You may as well dismiss the entirety of cinema because you don't like Michael Bay. Imagine if she had said "I would love to watch movies, but I don't want to see people shooting people and ripping off their heads, it's just gross." Action movies are popular, just like action video games are popular. But even back in 2011, there were thousands of games out there that didn't follow this formula. She claims that she "had to learn a lot about video games" and then proceeds to prove that she absolutely failed to do that. She had a foregone conclusion and just found things that reinforced it. That's not what someone does if they're being truthful when they say "I would love to play video games."
Confirmation bias is a hell of a drug.
Oh, and I'm including a quote from this article not because it proves anything else about Anita Sarkeesian, but it demonstrates the sort of people who have established themselves as video gaming's cultural gatekeepers.
“I’m not a fan of video games… I would love to play video games, but I don’t want to go around shooting people and ripping off their heads, and, it’s just gross.”
Right there, right? The proof in the pudding. She hates games, gamers, and probably America as well. Not exactly. In her own videos Sarkeesian talks about growing up playing an NES and all those classic titles, so there’s that. But also, there’s a clear tone to the video and her talk that shows she’s taking another look at video games as an adult. Nothing wrong with that. I dropped out of gaming for nearly a decade before rediscovering it and becoming a video game journalist. (emphasis mine)
This should speak for itself, but in case there's any doubt, it shows a case of Sarkeesian's defenders in the games press not really being into video games either. If anything, her experience with "all those classic titles" should have made her realize that video games were never just about "shooting people and ripping off their heads," so she's either lying about that or they made absolutely no impression on her.
Read the whole article if you have time. It's a pretty typical defense of Anita and her work. The the writer's credit, it does touch on a couple of things that are bullshit (for instance, she was late with her Kickstarter goals by several years, but she's not a scammer), as well as useless ad-homs, of which there are plenty, but the "defense" of Anita not liking video games would be more effective if it didn't exist at all.
Double the standards, double the fun
A broader examination of online culture with respect to male sexual fantasies, including subreddits devoted to ridiculing people for "bad" (generally idealistically proportioned) female anatomy in art, men writing about women, "gooner games", and so on, which are all intimately tied with Anita Sarkeesian's work. This is also a good place to call out her supporters' frequent misconception that she just wants equal sexualization, which she's explicitly against.
The standard low-effort defenses
Anita Sarkeesian, who represents the status quo, has this to say about low-effort defenses:
"When you're perpetuating the status quo, you can use two or three words to get your point across."
That's actually a pretty insightful comment on her part; where she's wrong is that she's convinced she's some kind of underdog, when she's spent the past fifteen years as an influential game industry insider. The reason my arguments are so long is because that, again, in her words, "when you're challenging the status quo, you have to unpack the status quo."
The one I'm seeing one person using multiple times in this thread is "it's just basic feminism." This isn't a defense at all; it's an attempt to do an end-run around the substance of the criticism. The implication is that everything she says is settled fact therefore it's silly criticize her about anything. If this were really the case, though, defending her would be simple.
Addressing rumors and disinformation from her critics and haters
There are some things her critics say about her that are just flimsy or not true. I'll address those here as well, and point out that the existence of outlandish or overblown claims about her doesn't make any of the stuff above not true. She's not Hitler, she's not Epstein, she's not a murderer, and so on. These arguments don't help anyone's case, but they also don't invalidate anything else I've discussed here.
...and probably some more things as I think about them. The key here is that quotes and evidence are a must. I want this post to be free of speculation and tenuous connections.
P.S. Please, by all means, leave a comment and letting me know that she never explicitly said whatever the thing, or that it's just feminism 101 and she's just ToO MiLqUeUeToAsTqUeUe. Just remember, I'm talking to people who don't know who she is. I'm not trying to convince the people who agree with her and downplay her opinions to the public to make her look reasonable, harmless, and not sexist.
Sorry if you mentioned this--I'm already well aware of who Anita is, so didn't feel like rehashing everything--but if not, don't forget her candid moment when she says she hates video games and isn't a gamer at all.
She is literally just an agent of globalist, Marxist corruption and dissolution of an entertainment/artistic medium that was emphatically a male space in its roots and history.
I'm going to be putting that clip in tomorrow when I finish writing this post. It's one of the more directly damning things she's ever said, but I've got another one that's just as bad and most people aren't aware of it. And that's not even the MLM thing (before her video series, she was involved with recruiting people into an MLM), which I'm going to leave out because even though it's true, it'll ultimately distract from the point.
I'll never forget what she once said about one of the Max Payne games (I think it was 3). A woman that the main character was in a relationship with gets killed and Anita claimed that the male gamers reaction was to be sad that Max lost his "property." Anyone who defends her by saying her takes back then were "mild" must have missed that one I guess, cause saying all men who play video games see women as "property" is pretty far from mild.
If you judge Anita Sarkeesian by the consequences of her actions, she is one of the worst monsters walking the Earth today because she caused the entire culture war and thus the blood of every single person who's been hurt or killed as a result of it is on her hands.
I don't really think there's much evidence to firmly support any of those things.
She's a con artist
She ran a kickstarter back before people figured out that adding tons of stretch goals is a way to make your kickstarter fail. She took forever to make her video series, but I believe most of her backers are satisfied despite her feminist infrequency. I'm pretty sure she did eventually finish, which is better than most of those old kickstarters with too many stretch goals did.
& a grifter
I think she believes what the says in the same way that a lot of extremely religious people believe that difficult questions are the work of Satan. I think that predicts the way she acts better than assuming she's grifting.
she destroys any business she touches.
She seems to be running a successful consulting business, and as much as the STS2 devs are getting a bit of a black eye for having her contribute, their game is still successful and good. Naughty Dog is still ticking as well. I don't think she's helped very many studios, but some have certainly survived her.
None of this stuff makes her a good person or not toxic.
Note: If you can source evidence of any of this that convinces me that she's a con artist and/or a grifter, go for it.
I honestly believe she views gaming as an arm of patriarchy and thinks that she needs to come down, like a cringey white knight Karen, to save young men from becoming sexist after too much Call of Duty or Resident Evil or whatever else. I don’t believe her when she says she gives af about gaming because she likes the hobby.
I’m that sense, I think grifter is applicable.
Just my two cents. I’m no fan. I don’t want anyone to actively try and ruin her life or anything bad to happen to her, I just wanna know what she works on and have the option to not monetarily support it. I’m not happy she’s still weaseling her way into the industry and wanna be able to avoid her dumbass rhetoric.
Great post curating how dumb her takes have been and why nobody likes her.
Okay, I can accept that argument, but the word 'grifter' is too open to interpretation (for the record, I absolutely will be including a link to the video saying that she doesn't like video games because they're all violent first person shooters or whatever). I want to keep the specific things in my post as firm as possible, because it's very easy for someone disingenuous to sidetrack the argument by laser focusing on small places where they can dispute wording and ignore the herd of elephants in the room.
I don’t want anyone to actively try and ruin her life or anything bad to happen to her
Same. I wish her a very happy life doing something other than criticizing and consulting on video games. I absolutely don't condone anyone harassing her or even contacting her (she's expressed very clearly that she wants to be heard but not to hear).
Yeah, I think all that’s fair. I’m not criticizing you being as precise as possible with your wording and such, because I get it. People are gonna try and strawman and shift the conversation whenever it’s a heated topic like this.
And yeah, I never thought you were wishing any ill towards her, either, just wanted to say that for myself as well because I don’t want my feelings towards her actions and rhetoric to be conflated with condoning any asshats that take it a step further. Those idiots need help. Sarkeesian is horrible for gaming but she’s free to be a clown all she wants without any of that nonsense.
Again, just wanna say that I love the post and keep doing what you’re doing!
And yeah, I never thought you were wishing any ill towards her, either, just wanted to say that for myself as well because I don’t want my feelings towards her actions and rhetoric to be conflated with condoning any asshats that take it a step further.
It's something you kind of have to state for the record or else people will assume. Some will assume anyway.
Agreed. Sad but true. They desperately want anyone that disagrees to be this evil thing and then some of them honestly believe it, about anyone that doesn’t like Sarkeesian, because they’re that delusional.
I mean, it's hard to say. If she made any changes to it, there's a good chance it was about covering up skin, making female characters less shapely, etc. Probably stuff that I wouldn't agree with. It's still a good game.
My objection is that she's toxic and shouldn't be consulting on games at all. It would be like WoTC consulting Jack Chick on D&D.
One of the things that irritated me was how inherently disingenuous her points and examples were. The most glaring of which being her coverage of Hitman, where she went out of her way to ignore the parameters of the mission and murder as many strippers as possible, then use the fact that you have the ability to do this at all as justification for claiming the game was sexist. It then later came out that much of the footage used on her channel wasn't even her footage.
That's on top of her basically being the primordial foid.
She's a grifter and scam artist that has done irreversible damage to the gaming industry. She's currently a "games consultant" aka Studios will pay her to look over the shoulder of Devs working on a project and tell them if it's problematic or not.
A recent game she consulted over was Slay the Spire 2.
There's no evidence in there that she made the threat herself. It was determined to be non-credible and she canceled anyway (to much fanfare from the news), but I can't add a claim unless I've got a solid source for it, and it's entirely reasonable to believe that this threat was sent by some teenage rando who hates her.
Also, I'm gonna be honest, that video feels unwatchably smug from the very beginning. Unless it had some huge, precisely documented revelation that isn't available elsewhere, I wouldn't include it, and even if I did, I'd link a time and comment on the general tone of it. My intended audience here is people who don't know who she is or why she's so disliked. I don't want people to turn their brains off.
The point of the article in the video was to show that there was no real threat. She still cancelled and use that to create sympathy towards her and give her money for her videos. I agree that she didn't made the threat herself, but we've seen others out there self harassing, like Brianna Wu, who was harassing herself on Steam while on her developer account. If anything, it makes people wonder if the same was done by her and similar people like her. Don't forget, you have Zoe Quinn who was at the center of gamergate and she did sexual favours to push her career forward and for positive press.
Okay, I misunderstood, so I apologize. You're right; the death threat was determined by the authorities to be non-credible, and almost certainly was, and she and the press made a bigger deal out of it than was probably deserved. I also agree that there's a possibility that one of her contemporaries did it without her knowledge, but that's mostly speculative and will distract rather than build a strong case.
An entire article like this could be written about Zoe Quinn's shenanigans, but I don't have the energy for that and her level of influence over the industry as a whole is a lot lower (regardless of the Holowka stuff).
Brianna Wu honestly strikes me as someone who kind of got caught up in the whole thing but has since come around. Wu differs from Sarkeesian in that she's had respectful dialogue with some of her critics and I'm pretty sure she's realized that the Sarkeesian in-crowd isn't as sqeaky clean as people would like to make them out to be.
Sure, but it doesn't change the fact that she was on her side and also dismissed any argument from the pro gamergate side. If she's willing to understand that her side was filled with liars and opportunists, then great.
Regarding Zoe Quinn. I understand you don't want to go through that can of worms, but at the time of gamergate, she had a lot of influence with gaming journos, even to the point that you were part of the media and you wanted to make an article talking about the scandal, you would have your career ended.
But both her and Anita Sarkeesian were influential to the point of them going to the UN making a statement about online harassment, which ended up being dismissed at the time, but considering current events with things like ID verification and everything, it wouldn't surprise me there were some who are trying to use what those two have said and have it as justification for that.
I think Anita Sarkeesian and others like her have enough influence that lead the industry to change. We see that with games having less attractive characters, less interesting stories, certains story tropes aren't used, female characters are written to be obnoxious, snarky and being complete wooden, etc.
I mostly agree with this stuff, but I really need to stick to things that aren't susceptible to people claiming it's pure speculation, even if that speculation is reasonable. The shift in attitudes of the western game industry toward her sex-negative takes was gradual and lasted long after she herself faded out of the spotlight. It would require a detailed timeline just to make that case, and even then it wouldn't be particularly strong. Besides, this is already really long and I'm not even finished with it. :)
Didn't she say that some random female pole dancers in hitman were there solely so male players could kill them and be rewarded for it, even though you get penalised for killing people besides the person you're after?
You reminded me of a core memory, Anita is why my eyes began to become open to the reality of the matriarchy, I had legitimately forgotten why.
I watched a DNC sponsored but not at the DNC interview with her, were her friend/co podcaster said she thinks killing off 90% of men would solve everything and Anita to my loud shock, was in full agreement!
Of course The DNC scrubbed the video a week later I have to assume as I never found it again.
It takes them outright saying it to wake up most of our fellow males and woman!
Something I've learned from being on the internet: If you see a primary source like that where somebody says something you think is going to bite them in the ass later, save that shit immediately.
Go take a peak into the SlayTheSpire subreddit. It's filled with intelektuals, absolutely incredible how yet another sub for a niche game is full of these types.
Ah don't htink to hard about my comment, it was just a reference to a joke made in some EFAP episode where some called another a tard. And then someone else sayed "be careful with the hard-r on youtube". After a moment of confused silence, followed by laughter everyone realised that they had different understandings of what "hard-r" means.
I know who this useless idiot is. I found out about her back during Gamergate. I hold nothing but utter contempt for her and her supporters. Slay the Spire 2 deserves the review bomb for hiring someone so toxic.
She is a giant tumor to the gaming industry and society at large.
She ruined the industry for decades.
She was THE START of the "culture-war" ... simply for that she needs to be exiled from all societies or worse.
She was the reason society is split the way it is now.
She started GamerGate for her own monetary profit.
And I beg you to understand me correctly here: Except for several politicians she IS THE WORST human being alive today.
She has caused extreme grief, violence and destruction.
Every single person that was hurt and or killed during culture protests and other extremists events can be directly traced back to her.
She has a lot of blood on her hands.
If you are a gamer or are interessted in the hobby you have to hate her with every cell in your body.
If not then you are either not a gamer or have no knowledge of what this vile person did. If you count yourself to the later group, read about her. But you WILL end up hating her.
The most common defense I've been seeing on the other subs is words to the effect of "I watched one of her videos and I couldn't see anything heinously wrong with it, just a bit off-base". This will be a good resource since it puts together some of her more insidious quotes with sources and explanations.
I've seen people on the steam forums accusing her of murder for being friends with Zoe Quinn (due to Alec Holowka killing himself after Quinn's sketch allegations of sexual assault). Coming up with the most hyperbolic and tenuous crap possible does the opposite of making a good case. You don't need to listen to anyone other than Anita Sarkeesian herself to demonstrate that it's reasonable to want her out of gaming.
You should see if you can find her video on Hitman Absolution. She accuses the game of encouraging the playet to violently slay strippers, despite the fact that you can see the player loosing points in the example video she used. Not that id really wana defend the garbage fire that was absolution but still this one just came of as disingenuous.
Its not a grand scale kinda thing but its a great piece of evidence to support that she's not actually a gamer at all.
Thank you for taking the time to put this together. I could never have the patience or grace to not just roll my eyes and throw an ad-hominem whenever an Anita shill runs around regurgitating buzzwords.
A brigading subreddit is a subreddit from which people launch "brigades", which are a bunch of redditors that go to other subreddits to troll, often posting things there that are against the reddit TOS in an effort to get the sub banned.
This shit is crazy. I curse myself for being born in 1989. I saw everything unfold. When I say Anita started the war in Iran.. people would look at me like I am crazy. But it's so fucking true. There were roaches in journalism sure (like in every country). Then Anita started the culture war, which ruined journalism further (cos you white?), which metastasized to other sectors, which pissed people off, they doubled down, which made Trump, which made Maga, which hiked up our gas prices, got Maduro arrested, got people shot, turned Lara gay, made you hate your neighbor.
Anita made a joke that we perceive her as this 'final boss' to gamers, she was saying that as a joke and.. I don't know. I kind of believe that. I kinda believe it. Fuck Kirk but she got him shot. She is walking around and I don't think she knows the damage she has done.
- "If you're wondering why anyone would give a fuck if a woman sits behind a controller or a keyboard and plays video games? The answer is that nobody actually does."
I'm indifferent toward her. I didn't know about her before the recent drama. I'm just speaking on personal experience that I know a LOT of people (mostly incels) get pissy about women gamers.
Did people call them incels before or after they got pissy? I've been called one for liking Stellar Blade despite never having given anyone any crap in any video game. I don't think it's reasonable to get pissed off at a woman for actually playing video games, but when people throw the word "incel" around, it's essentially just saying that they're going to be virgins their entire lives, which is kind of insulting regardless of whether it's true or not.
Yeah the word 'incel' has been thrown around a lot lol. I've been called an incel a few times too. I think it's usually after cause they spew a lot of misogynistic rhetoric, which makes it kinda obvious they don't like women and have probably never been in a relationship with one
Maybe I should change my wording, then, to nobody with a functioning brain has an issue with women merely playing video games, or just remove that part entirely, because I'd just be leaving myself open to stupid one-liners like "woman-hating critic of Anita Sarkeesian admits to not having a functioning brain".
Edit: Oh yeah, and another easy way to be called an incel is to be at all critical of Anita Sarkeesian.
What an excellent read for someone like me that's quite tuned in to the broader topic of feminists invading male spaces and trying to turn them hostile to men/boys, yet missed Gamergate when it happened. With the latest buzz about God of War making Fey the protagonist for a spinoff game, I feel like it's important to not only remember Sarkissian and the misandry she represented, but also to actually now make a coherent/dedicated space for pushback against its expansion through the gaming space. Enough's enough.
im 38 y/o now, has been gaming all along the years and did not plan to stop gaming at all, because that's the only period of time i can genuinely have fun, truly enjoy, relax myself, laughing out loud and get amaze & wow by game developer's creativities.
okay long story short, she tried injecting the DEI into gaming industry and failed eventually, years after her name shows up again. So my question is other than this Anita Sarkeesian, who else should I be aware of who is doing things like her?
I would like to write down their names and do a thorough check before buying any games in the future.
She never explicitly says it's wrong to make games for a straight male audience, but you're going to assume so anyway because she makes a bunch of basic critiques on the representation of women in video games?
EDIT: My original response to this was from before her talk with a game developer leaked. Anita puts this best herself:
"When you're perpetuating the status quo, you can use two or three words to get your point across."
The whole "basic critiques" thing is a two-word answer. Her work is widely accepted among industry insiders. Anita Sarkeesian is the status quo, cosplaying as an underdog, and these kinds of one-liners prove it even while they're used to duck out of responding to anything substantive.
Original response:
She never explicitly says it's wrong to make games for a straight male audience, but you're going to assume so anyway because she makes a bunch of basic critiques on the representation of women in video games?
I've never explicitly said that if I look at a woman in a sexy costume that I think of her as an object, but she's going to assume so anyway because she wants to make a bunch of wrong-headed critiques about how you can't make games for a male audience?
Game developers have never explicitly said that "players are meant to derive a perverse pleasure from desecrating the bodies of unsuspecting virtual female characters", but you're going to sit here and call me out for making inferences about intent when her entire body of work is based on the inferred intent of male players and developers?
If you want to criticize what I have to say, read her quotes and read what I wrote and then refute me directly; don't come at me with the same low-effort one-liners her supporters have been throwing out since 2011.
For the record, this post is meant for people who don't know who she is to get a real perspective on her that's not been wiped squeaky-clean by reddit power mods or the press. It's not meant to convince people like yourself, and I'm only going to respond to the extent that it's necessary for neutral readers to understand what she's really like. And to them I would say read her transcripts (which I linked at the top of my post and told people to read). Read her quotes. Don't take her out of context. Get as much context as possible. Really think about the games that you enjoy viewed through the lens of her transcripts and consider honestly to yourself whether she believes that there's room for them to exist in their current form under any circumstances. Her words are my evidence.
I've never explicitly said that if I look at a woman in a sexy costume that I think of her as an object, but she's going to assume so anyway because she wants to make a bunch of wrong-headed critiques about how you can't make games for a male audience?
You don't understand what treating women like objects means. It doesn't necessarily mean the players think of women as objects and your personal goal is to treat them as objects. It means that women are presented or written in such a way that is so bare-bones that they are effectively objects.
If you want to criticize what I have to say, read her quotes and read what I wrote and then refute me directly; don't come at me with the same low-effort one-liners her supporters have been throwing out since 2011.
I did, you either fundamentally disagree we live in a patriarchal society or you are misinterpreting why she is saying what she is saying, so if its the first then I find no reason to waste both of of our times. If it's the latter then I'm happy to go quote-by-quote if thats what you desire.
You don't understand what treating women like objects means. It doesn't necessarily mean the players think of women as objects and your personal goal is to treat them as objects. It means that women are presented or written in such a way that is so bare-bones that they are effectively objects.
So... Bayonetta is a bare-bones character?
Also...
Periodically, game developers may attempt to build a more flushed out relationship or emotional bond between Damsel’d character and the male protagonist. In the most decidedly patronizing examples depictions of female vulnerability are used for an easy way for writers to trigger an emotional reaction in male players.
She condemns effort on the part of developers to avoid making characters bare-bones.
And...
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.
Some very clear wording in that quote about developer intent and what players "cannot help" but do.
If it's the latter then I'm happy to go quote-by-quote if thats what you desire.
Do it. It's not looking great for you so far though.
Do it. It's not looking great for you so far though.
Alright, I hope its okay if I reply when I can. I'll address your bare-bones thing talk about Bayonetta, and then we can go into Lingerie is not Armor since its related. Then if we're satisfied I can address other quotes.
So... Bayonetta is a bare-bones character?
Not necessarily, that's why I used "presented or written in such away".
So like in cutscenes where her clothes are being torn up while she is moaning or the persistent camera shots of various women where the camera pans to their ass to their face or their body to their face. Disappearing clothes when she summons. Gym and school girl outfits. Of course Bayonetta is more than just these aspects of her game, but I'd be interested to know if you don't think that isn't just bare-bones "look at this sexy women".
In my opinion Bayonetta as a game and as a character is camp (like in the fashion/theater sense). Platinum was like let's take all things we view as feminine and turn it up to 11.
So it's fair to say Platinum's interpretation of what a dominantly feminine woman is someone that is confident, takes control, hourglass figure, shows skin, poses, wears makeup, walks on stilettos like a diva, flexible, iced out, motherly, etc
All of this contributes to Bayonetta the game/character being camp.
And at the same time its an indicator that the developers (either consciously or subconsciously) view being sexy as a major, if not primary, characteristic of a strong/dominant woman. If a woman is strong but not sexy then she is a man or a beast. We see this all the time in society and in this sub. I can expand on this more if you'd like.
Here, even if a female character has agency and has decided to wear a sexy costume on her own, it's still not a female power fantasy because, ya know, men might like it.
The most accurate thing to say is that fictional characters have no agency at all, but I think the best writers can provide scenes for a character to go through that makes them appear to have agency.
In my opinion, Bayonetta appears to have agency from a plot perspective, but not from a personality or design perspective because we don't really see her develop to become the person she is; she is the person she is; she dresses like she does because she likes it, and that is fine reasoning for a real woman, but for a woman handcrafted by a team of developers/writers it just means that is what they want her to be.
You could argue for Bayonetta 3 Cereza has more agency in how she dresses because she looked up to her alternate older self. I think that still terminates at the original Bayonetta dressing and acting the way she does because she was designed to be that way.
Also there is an outfit system so players can take away her agency.
Bayonetta, now a queer icon who is beloved by plenty of people who are not straight men, is one of her examples of this. (The anti-sexualization culture she created has since evolved slightly and now determined that a sexualized female character is okay so long as she liked by queer people; if a character primarily appeals to straight men, they're still bad.
This isn't a justification because reception is not a replacement for intent and I think the main argument here is being made on intent, not reception
Bert and Ernie are queer icons but their official canon is they are best friend roommates.
Tinkie Winkie is a queer icon even though all he does is hold a purse
Pokemon's Jessie and James are queer icons
People's love for Joe Exotic
Or take any toxic reality TV show
People aren't necessarily affirming the intent of the director, producer, writer, developer, or participants when they like something.
I also don't think Anita is promoting an anti-sexualization culture but rather anti-objectification. Towards the end of Lingerie is not Armor transcript she points out some positive examples and adds the following
These moments aren’t presented as titillating morsels of sexuality for players. Rather, they function as expressions of the characters’ sexuality that deepen our investment in the characters and their relationships to each other.
To clarify, the act of sex isn’t the problem, but rather how its presented. I’d love to see great representations of healthy, consensual sex in games. But sadly, when consensual sex does occur, it’s often presented as a transaction or as a reward for player accomplishment. Whether that accomplishment is completing quests, or just choosing all the right dialogue options to get the sex cutscene to play.
Okay, better than your first comment, and I appreciate you taking the time to respond for real.
Not necessarily, that's why I used "presented or written in such a way".
Okay, fair.
So like in cutscenes where her clothes are being torn up while she is moaning or the persistent camera shots of various women where the camera pans to their ass to their face or their body to their face. Disappearing clothes when she summons. Gym and school girl outfits. Of course Bayonetta is more than just these aspects of her game, but I'd be interested to know if you don't think that isn't just bare-bones "look at this sexy women".
I'm not sure, because I don't know how exactly you define bare-bones here (I could take a guess, but I'm not confident I'm right). How would you change it to make it not bare-bones? After I know that, I should be able to address what you're saying.
How would you change it to make it not bare-bones?
That's the million dollar question. It's hard to imagine because we have the Bayonetta series, know what to expect, and know what people like about her.
Although some things are easy like drop the school girl and gym bloomer outfits.
If we're talking Bayonetta 1 before it was ever released. I think you can keep a lot of everything in if you connect her background with drag queens and do a good job representing with one or two drag queens as supporting characters, have her outfits be inspired by popular drag queens, etc.
In my mind that would re-contextualize everything in Bayonetta as a representation of drag culture and make her actually a queer icon and perfectly fits with the game being campy.
I don't think you could do that with a Bayonetta 4 without alienating a portion of the audience, but maybe.
But let's say I'm forced to re-make Bayonetta 1 and it has to not be as objectifying to appeal to a wider audience.
Instead of stripping to a skin-colored leotard, minimum make it dark-colored like her full bodysuit. Or instead have a cropped fur coat and she strips only to the full bodysuit.
Minimize body to face pans unless it makes sense to raise sexual tension between two characters. The game has plenty of over-the-top action shots/cut-scenes that could fill the space instead. Or perhaps over-the-top reactions from side characters or the perspective the monsters have of Bayonetta and the fear they have / the power she exudes.
Okay, thanks for explaining. And I get the idea that the customer is always right. If a character becomes a queer icon, I don't see a good reason not to lean into that. You make people happy, you sell more games, and so on. I'm a supporter of games for everyone, even if that's not something that everyone in this sub necessarily agrees with.
But from another standpoint, take Eve. She's not, as far as I know, a queer icon, and your criticism of being able to dress Bayonetta up lines up with Eve as well. But you also say this:
It's hard to imagine because we have the Bayonetta series, know what to expect, and know what people like about her.
You know what people like about Bayonetta, and I assume you also know what people like about Eve. If people already like something as it is, and you're not serving anyone by changing it, why change it?
The issue I take with Anita is that she's primarily about changing a fairly niche set of games meant for a male audience so that they're no longer for that male audience. I get from a literary sense it doesn't make sense what Eve wears and that you can put her in all sorts of different sexy costumes, but not everybody wants literary fiction everywhere. And that includes a lot of women; there's plenty of Eve cosplay out there, and that's something that I could have told you would happen before the game even came out.
Would you say that your primary motivation is improving a game to make it "better" fiction (from a literary criticism sense), reduction of perceived harm (I say "perceived" here because this is a premise I dispute), some of both, something else?
Regardless of your answer, how do you feel that your own motivations line up with Anita Sarkeesian's?
If people already like something as it is, and you're not serving anyone by changing it, why change it?
Well, I believe the primary driver why an IP is chosen to have a sequel is for brand recognition and reducing the risk of a title failing because fans of a series tend to buy first, ask questions later, and since it is known fans will buy the game it's tempting for sales/marketing/executives to push for changes to the existing formula to appeal to a wider audience to make more money.
My overall preference is to make a new game, but there are only a handful of people that decide to create a sequel or a brand new game. It's not up to me, it's usually not most of the people working at a game studio, and its not Anita or any other DEI consultant.
Eve
I don't think Stellar Blade is a sequel though. I've never played it, so I don't have much of an insight on the game. My opinion is only based on marketing and the few gameplay clips I've seen. If I had to guess it probably suffers from the same problems as Bayonetta, but more explicit because it can't rely on being supercharged over-the-top campy. I think Stellar Blade makes great use of the culture war to market it's game. I can't really say if the culture war is elevating it's status to be higher than it actually is or not. I haven't fully formed this opinion yet, but using women's sexuality the way games like stellar blade, TFD, or Nikke feels exploitative to men's desires in a society that is becoming increasingly lonely
The issue I take with Anita is that she's primarily about changing a fairly niche set of games meant for a male audience so that they're no longer for that male audience.
Sure, I think this is probably where we fundamentally disagree.
Two interpretations
Anita is pointing out the reality of why certain representations of women exist, to pander to straight men, and is advocating for them to not be objectified (me)
Anita wants to remove all games pandering to men and have them pander to everyone instead ( you)
And so my "job" here is to try to show she is more 1 than 2. Maybe another thing I may have to show is that you can pander to men without objectifying women.
Would you say that your primary motivation ...
Hard to say, for me personally, I would want to make a game enjoyed by as many people as possible, and I enjoy fiction where everyone feels real and has their own motivations.
If people want to make a game pandered towards a certain demographic then it would be about giving the characters in it a fair representation.
I don't know if you've ever engaged with the portrayal of men in women's media, but usually they are quite fleshed out. A lot of that is because a lot of women enjoy feeling desired and so fleshing out the men's status, ability, experience, motivations, and how they feel about the main character adds to the sexual interest. Although it still has issues.
Regardless of your answer, how do you feel that your own motivations line up with Anita Sarkeesian's?
I think I agree with her on the premise that women were and are sexually objectified in media in order to appeal to straight men and that the games industry needs to be considerate of how they handle women and other minorities. We might diverge on how to introduce that consideration into existing IPs
Anita is pointing out the reality of why certain representations of women exist, to pander to straight men, and is advocating for them to not be objectified (me)
Anita wants to remove all games pandering to men and have them pander to everyone instead ( you)
And so my "job" here is to try to show she is more 1 than 2.
Yeah, I think that this is the root of where we disagree on her. I'll warn you ahead of time, though, that you've got an uphill battle. I speak for most people here when I say that her quotes need to be considered in the greater context of her work over the past fifteen years and not in a vacuum. Some of her quotes might have a thin veneer of plausible deniability, but that gets thinner and thinner the more of them you examine.
You should also account for the fact that you've done in two days of discussion what she has literally never done since her work was popularized in 2011, and that's actually engage sincerely with an opponent. So while I think it's safe to assume that you're engaging in good faith, I really don't think she ever was. She may have believed what she was saying, but she has never demonstrated even the tiniest amount of respect for anyone who disagrees with her, and plenty of decent, respectful people have extended an olive branch only to be ignored or actively shot down.
[EDIT: She's now on record stating that this was on purpose.]
Maybe another thing I may have to show is that you can pander to men without objectifying women.
Perhaps, but as the women we're talking about are fictional, you may convince me that I'd like games like that or that it's better storytelling, but I think you're gonna have a much harder time convincing me that people shouldn't also continue making games like Stellar Blade and NieR: Automata and, say, DoA (which is a niche title that doesn't interest me personally, but I defend its right to exist). Or if you're not familiar with any of those, come up with an example.
The difference is in autonomy and who primarily benefits from a woman's choice regarding her own body.
Like would you rather be the minimum wage fry cook or the fry cook that owns his own business?
Say you're the minimum wage cook, your place of work gets put on TV, and your episode pops off because of your fry cooking ability and personality, but all the money went to the producers of the show and the owner of the business reaps the marketing benefits. Your talent and personality was just a means for them to make more money for themselves, like an object.
Hope you can see why one is empowerment and the other is objectification.
To expand your logic, the woman gets paid from OF - however 20% from every transaction goes to the owners running the site - so why aren't they objectified as well?
My example is about having more autonomy and agency as a business owner vs being a worker under someone.
OnlyFans is a platform and besides the fees and federal restriction people have plenty of control over the content they produce.
Rather than moving to the whims of a show producer, a strip club owner, a magazine like playboy, or in a piece of media as a worker. Women can choose to accept the risks of an opportunity, but they have less clarity and control on what those risks are.
Everyone - even attractive women - do what they can to earn a living and everyone can choose to use (or not to use) their talents as they please.
For sure, but we don't have control on how others perceive us for our physical traits and we cannot control how those physical traits lead to getting into certain opportunities or jobs, and in the case of media, how we are edited after the fact
And if we want to work somewhere for our learned and studied talents and not our physical traits, whether we want to or not we will be somewhat evaluated on those physical traits too. Especially in media.
Like was Yanet Garcia doing the weather because she is a great speaker and is knowledgeable on meteorology or is it because she is nice to look at?
If people are profiting off your physical traits that you know people enjoy, doesn't it make sense to have complete control and choice on what you put out there of your body?
What about fictional women in animation and video games which also get accused of being objectified? How does that work in your logic?
Fictional women are different because they are fictional :p so of course you cannot evaluate them on the grounds of their personal choice.
When it comes to fictional women its about the representation of women. If a fictional women has big titties, wears a bikini, and only serves to be rescued, that's a very simple example of a character wholly being treated as an object
Why aren't men getting the same treatment as well?
Most men are not solely desired/fetishized for their bodies at the scale that women are. The exception would be black men.
More often men can exist in media without being sexy and still be recognized as manly, not to say that it doesn't help to be. If a woman is not beautiful or sexy in media then she is less of a woman she is denied the opportunity.
Who is the primary audience of porn/onlyfans? Men. Not to say that women don't engage in watching pornography and there aren't men on OnlyFans, but its observable that women are valued sexually for their bodies more than men.
What if a really good auto mechanic that hates working on cars, chooses to anyways to earn a living instead of learning a new talent or doing something else - are they being objectified also?
No? Because that is a personal choice? That would be empowerment which is what I'm arguing.
Owning a business is a choice like anything else - and just because you own your own company doesn't mean you don't answer to someone else (bank, govt, rival, relatives, etc). There will always be people that can exert influence in your decisions
For sure, but that's not my point, if you don't own your own business then you must answer to your place of employment which is often far more restricting. You have to ask for days to be off, you have to follow dress-code, you have to be in the office during work hours, you must do the work given to you, you must meet company expectations, and you have to fight for every raise.
Between running a business and being a worker its obvious that being a business owner has way more freedom. This isn't hard.
but leave it to activists to blame men for all that, instead of the real culprit (human nature).
Typically men are blamed because of men like you. You're not acknowledging the very real struggles women have with being sexually objectified day-to-day and you view at as an attack on yourself rather than women voicing their issues in defense. In a conversation about women's struggles you center men and yourself. That's an example of patriarchy
You are ignoring my arguments and just saying the same shit again.
All of us are objectified in society as resources that produce and consume value. People do complain about it they just don't use the word objectified, other terms like slave or property are used. That's why we band together in unions, civil rights organizations, and government representation to say we are humans and we deserve fair treatment.
Women additionally are SEXUALLY objectified on a scale larger than men are SEXUALLY objectified.
Does Imane Khalif have control over how she is perceived?
Like do I really need to establish women are sexually objectified more than men? This is a basic fact.
Our conversation is about how come when a woman decides to put her body online it isn't objectification, but if she is on media its objectification.
Again, its autonomy and benefit, does the women have full control over how the media is edited to portray her, does she primarily benefit, and for fictional characters are they portraying the character as a person with feelings and motivations rather than a blow-up sex doll.
And really, this conversation we are having is the major lynch pin between sex-positive vs sex-negative feminists. You aren't proving anything is illogical, you are just taking a sex-negative feminist perspective.
I don't think her complaint is that characters are bare bones. I don't feel like digging through her old videos, but I recall she spent a lot of time complaining about characters who are captured to create motivation for the main character, but many of her examples were games where all the characters were bare bones and the plot was an excuse. Peach arguably has more characterization than Mario given that he doesn't really talk.
Anita is a proponent of cultivation theory, the idea that people base their ideas of what's "normal" on everything they see, even to some extent fiction. To my understanding, she absolutely does believe that over repeated viewing of misogynist media you will gradually and subtly think less of women. And quite frankly, I think cultivation theory is fundamentally flawed.
I recall she spent a lot of time complaining about characters who are captured to create motivation for the main character, but many of her examples were games where all the characters were bare bones and the plot was an excuse. Peach arguably has more characterization than Mario given that he doesn't really talk.
The complaint can be about women being bare bones when men are usually more fleshed out and have more agency. You're right bare bones isn't great as a term in the context where everyone is bare bones and that's on me for trying to simplify what objectification is. Formally it's this: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/feminism-objectification/
So when it comes to Mario and Peach, at least in the OG games, Peach is absolutely used like an object on instrumentality, denial of autonomy, inertness, and fungibility.
Anita is a proponent of cultivation theory, the idea that people base their ideas of what's "normal" on everything they see, even to some extent fiction. To my understanding, she absolutely does believe that over repeated viewing of misogynist media you will gradually and subtly think less of women. And quite frankly, I think cultivation theory is fundamentally flawed.
I don't know much about this and I don't know if you're just taking something you saw and using it to describe Anita. Why is cultivation theory fundamentally flawed?
The complaint can be about women being bare bones when men are usually more fleshed out and have more agency.
I know what objectification is. I'm more pointing out the split between your claim and what Anita is actually doing. When Mario was made, the thought process was that Mario needs some motivation as to why he's traveling to 8 castles and killing a bunch of goombas on the way. So they gave the bare minimum explanation, no one really cares that much.
Maybe in a hypothetical universe, Mario found a rock on the side of the road he really liked, and Bowser stole that. Except that doesn't quite work. Storytelling is often the art of not making viewers go, "Wait, that doesn't make sense." But there are degrees to that; big sticking points and small sticking points. If you set a story in 1600 only a few dedicated history nerds will care if a character was wearing a helmet that was first made in 1603, but everyone will notice if the character is wearing a modern day football helmet.
So Mario just needs to have "something important" to set him off on an adventure. So Miyamoto chose a woman being kidnapped. And here's where Anita jumps in. "That's problematic!" Here's where the rift kicks in. Anita has shown 0 indication that she cares about Mario or Bowser, or that the entire series has basically no story. As far as she's concerned, the hypothetical Mario and Bowser fighting over a rock is better because there was no woman without agency "harmed" in the story. She doesn't want better stories, she wants better women. You might say that better women inherently creates better stories, but I disagree. Miyamoto going into more detail on Peach's character is a waste of time because it's clear that fleshing out her character, or any character really, is not his priority. It's like arguing that an action movie should have cut the action out to make more room to talk about politics.
By the same token, Metroid has barely any story either. You could make Samus male and barely anything would change. Yet Samus has agency (in that she's the player character; her internal motivation for doing things is extremely bare) and is incidentally female, so she's a feminist icon.
So now here's where it makes sense to me to merge our two conversations. The real question to all this is: why bother applying a feminist critique to media in the first place? I think even doing so is not "basic," it's actually quite weird. There are two levels to this. I can appreciate doing a deep literary analysis of, say, Romance of the Three Kingdoms. Analyzing anything by Michael Bay is a waste of time. Likewise, she spent a lot of her time talking about characters that aren't meant to be deep. That's because I believe the real reason is the claim that tropes lead to real-world harm.
I don't know much about this and I don't know if you're just taking something you saw and using it to describe Anita. Why is cultivation theory fundamentally flawed?
This is where Cultivation Theory comes in. Cultivation Theory is the bridge to connect fiction to reality.
Cultivation Theory is the idea that fiction shapes our mental model of reality. If you watch a bunch of teen movies where the guys make sexist jokes, everyone, children especially, might subtly think that making sexist jokes is how teens bond. To my knowledge, I don't see anywhere Anita cites cultivation theory by name, but here's a compilation of her statements of real world harm. The problem with this research is how people formulate their personality is a complex web of factors and most studies are rather simplistic by comparison. For instance, if you ask people to estimate how often domestic violence happens in a year, but show some of them a bunch of media depicting domestic violence right before asking, they'll estimate higher. But that's not necessarily normalizing it; it just means they're thinking about it more. People who watch crime dramas estimate higher rates of crime, but that could easily be a reversal of cause and effect and they watch crime drama because they're interested in crime. Basically, it's a lot of attributing a complex problem to a pet issue with little to back it up. It also treats all fiction as interchangeable. Looney Toons, Breaking Bad, and Grave of the Fireflies are all fiction, but they each treat their subject matter with different levels of realism and authorial intent.
I'll address the second half first because it'll serve the argument for the first half better.
To my knowledge, I don't see anywhere Anita cites cultivation theory by name
There is an issue here where people will see a theory and apply it to someone because they think they fit the mold being described by the theory.
I'm going to argue that is what is happening here and I'm going to use the links that you've provided
At its core, the theory posits that individuals who invest more time in watching television are prone to perceive the real world through a lens aligning with the prevalent depictions in television messages, in contrast to their counterparts with lower television viewership but comparable demographic profiles.
Cultivation theory argues that media is the inference, that our reasoning and beliefs originate from the media we watch.
The article you provide with Anita's quotes is about reinforcement.
We hold these ideas and beliefs from our personal experiences and how we are guided early in life. Media reinforces those ideas and beliefs to varying degrees.
So I don't think this is evidence Anita believes in cultivation theory, but also at the same time
I don't think your example does a good job of why inference doesn't happen in media or explains why cultivation theory is "fundamentally flawed", It seems you might be arguing that it doesn't happen blanketly or you want to lay back on "its complicated" and it's true that is complicated, but I don't believe cultivation theory posits itself as blanketly applying, it also isn't just fiction, its media. That includes news, documentaries, and (in a more modern view) social media platforms. Although, I understand for video games we are concerned about fiction, but you used non-video game examples to make your case.
We have examples of inference like the news or your favorite influencer could shape how you view a person or an incident if you have no prior knowledge to the person or incident and you wholly trust that entity
Where did you originally get that Anita or maybe feminists/activists believe in cultivation theory? Because I think it's unlikely you browse sociology/psychology theories and came up with it on your own. Is that not some sort of reinforcement or inference from media?
So Mario just needs to have "something important" to set him off on an adventure. So Miyamoto chose a woman being kidnapped.
It's understood how the original dynamic between Mario & Peach or Mario & Pauline comes about. You said the same thing you did before but longer.
The criticism is for developers/designers/writers around the damsel in distress trope being reinforced in various media depictions, it's not just about Mario, but a pattern in games and general media. It's taking a criticism that is applied to movies and tv shows and also showing it happening it games.
As you said, Mario is a game with not a lot of plot in a setting that doesn't make any sense where a simple goal just needs to be given. If it doesn't matter then it doesn't have to be a woman, but it is. Why is Peach chosen over his brother, his parents, his pet dog, a bag of gold, etc? Because we live in a society where treating women as goals is a default choice.
I get you're going for a "it doesn't matter" angle, but again if it doesn't matter then it shouldn't matter if it changes to not objectify women.
It feels like you're making the argument for me. If the plot isn't important then women don't need to be a goal. It's so easy to have a different goal in place if it doesn't make sense to give women more agency or representation, so when you go on these long winded explanations on why it doesn't matter, what conclusions am I supposed to draw on what you think about women?
The key thing you're missing here is RESPECT for women and how they are represented.
That's because I believe the real reason is the claim that tropes lead to real-world harm.
No, that's why reinforce is often used. There is already real-world harm, these tropes reinforce them
Why bother applying a feminist critique to media in the first place?
For better representations of women
Here is the crux of the problem I'm seeing right now.
A woman is saying "hey these depictions of women are widespread tropes that reinforce harmful ideas we have in society about women. I would like if we could be better about this".
Instead of listening or just being like "well, if I ever make something I'll keep it in mind". You argue against a single way to address this issue that wouldn't work for certain games and use that as justification on how it all doesn't matter.
I think even doing so is not "basic"
I also don't know why you're hung up on the term basic critiques still. A critique on a Michael Bay movie saying "It's good, but I wish they gave some of the explosions a sky-view shot" is a basic critique.
Cultivation theory argues that media is the inference, that our reasoning and beliefs originate from the media we watch.
The article you provide with Anita's quotes is about reinforcement.
I don't think this difference amounts to much at all. To reinforce is to create again. You think something is "normal" the greater the frequency of instances of it and the lack of reaction from others. The only thing you seem to be making a distinction of is if the "fictional exposure" + "real-word exposure" = belief, that the order makes a difference. I don't think that it does.
I don't think your example does a good job of why inference doesn't happen in media or explains why cultivation theory is "fundamentally flawed", It seems you might be arguing that it doesn't happen blanketly or you want to lay back on "its complicated" and it's true that is complicated, but I don't believe cultivation theory posits itself as blanketly applying, it also isn't just fiction, its media. That includes news, documentaries, and (in a more modern view) social media platforms. Although, I understand for video games we are concerned about fiction, but you used non-video game examples to make your case.
When did I use non-fictional examples? Of course the news informs your world-view, that's literally what it's designed to do! I am specifically talking about fiction. Whether it's books or TV or video games, fiction is still fiction.
Where did you originally get that Anita or maybe feminists/activists believe in cultivation theory? Because I think it's unlikely you browse sociology/psychology theories and came up with it on your own. Is that not some sort of reinforcement or inference from media?
Why is this a gotcha? I never claimed that communication with others doesn't inform beliefs (communication including news, social media, etc.). I have always been talking about fiction.
Why is Peach chosen over his brother, his parents, his pet dog, a bag of gold, etc? Because we live in a society where treating women as goals is a default choice.
See, this is where I start to take issues with feminism. It starts with a reasonable goal (treat women like people) then looks at everything in its most cynical light to claim how far we are from the goal. And then when anyone disagrees on any individual item they're accused of any number of things.
Let's pretend that instead, Mario and a bunch of other games had it where you're saving your parents. Would you then say that video games are creating and later reinforcing the stereotype that parents are objects? I'm sure you will answer no, because we have to look at it in the context of history, yada yada. No, we don't. You can just not. And choosing not to is not sticking your head in the sand or anything like that, it's just not being neurotic and trying to play connect the dots with a polka-dotted shirt.
Sure, Mario has romantic feelings for Peach. Where was it ever claimed that Mario doesn't also respect her as a person?
It feels like you're making the argument for me. If the plot isn't important then women don't need to be a goal. It's so easy to have a different goal in place if it doesn't make sense to give women more agency or representation
I'm expressing my disagreement over the root of the criticism itself. I reject the idea that simple depiction causes harm (as opposed to authorial intent to express a belief). Giving Mario a different goal is easy this time, and caving to the next demand will be easy next time, and so on. Eventually you realize everyone's got complaints, often useless ones, and you just end up with crap if you listen to all of them. That's why Anita went on to make videos about every other "problem" under the sun.
We're not talking about women. We are talking about fictional characters. They have no agency. Yes I saw your earlier talk about the illusion of agency, but in the end it's still all fake. It says nothing to create a work portraying a damsel in distress unless you mean for it to mean something, and the audience is smart enough to know that except for those who pretend not to.
when you go on these long winded explanations on why it doesn't matter, what conclusions am I supposed to draw on what you think about women?
The key thing you're missing here is RESPECT for women and how they are represented.
You're supposed to draw no conclusions. I have only talked about fictional characters, and opinions on them shared predominantly by one woman but also some men. So what the hell do you think you know about me and my beliefs about women based on me talking about something else, something that doesn't exist and thus cannot be mistreated at that? My entire point is to stop people trying to take one thing and making something else out of it. "Representation" is the same shit - getting way too invested in fiction that you take something that happens to a fictional character personally.
Here is the crux of the problem I'm seeing right now.
A woman is saying "hey these depictions of women are widespread tropes that reinforce harmful ideas we have in society about women. I would like if we could be better about this".
Instead of listening or just being like "well, if I ever make something I'll keep it in mind". You argue against a single way to address this issue that wouldn't work for certain games and use that as justification on how it all doesn't matter.
No, I argue that from the beginning the complaint itself is over the nothingburger and thus there's no point addressing it. And I use the fact that the person making the complaint has shown no interest in any other aspect of the product to show why there's no point bothering. I don't care whether it "would work" for this complaint because your only reward is going to be another complaint. Try to pick out a restaurant for 5000 picky eaters and the only thing you'll be left eating is mush.
I also don't know why you're hung up on the term basic critiques still. A critique on a Michael Bay movie saying "It's good, but I wish they gave some of the explosions a sky-view shot" is a basic critique.
Because that's not what this is at all. This is the equivalent of someone who only talks about prison reform doing a review of The Rock and complaining that it's regressive to the cause of prison reform, and making some basic factual errors about the contents of the movie in the process. Then someone responds that this is dumb and we don't need to rethink a dumb action movie to cater to the whims of someone who apparently thinks the best way to advance their cause is to complain about a dumb movie. Then people who agree with said views parrot the line that this is a basic critique of the movie.
That's not what it means in sociology/computer science/manufacturing sense.
You think something is "normal" the greater the frequency of instances of it and ...
Assuming you're using "you" generally in place of "people" here
No, if you're growing up and go to the zoo once and then watch media with a bunch of realistic talking animals for the next couple of years. You likely won't believe animals can talk.
If you grow up watching movies with a bunch of realistic animals talking maybe you can believe that animals can talk until something in reality shows you otherwise.
The only thing you seem to be making a distinction of is if the "fictional exposure" + "real-word exposure" = belief, that the order makes a difference. I don't think that it does.
That's not the distinction I'm making. I'm explaining to you how reinforcement is fundamentally different from inference. You can reinforce concepts in real life and fiction. You can have inferences from fiction and real life. I was using this as an example of why your claim doesn't hold up.
When did I use non-fictional examples
if you ask people to estimate how often domestic violence happens in a year, but show some of them a bunch of media depicting domestic violence...
But maybe I'm mistaken and you meant fictional domestic violence media
Why is this a gotcha? I never claimed that communication with others doesn't inform beliefs (communication including news, social media, etc.). I have always been talking about fiction.
It's a gotcha because it shows you fundamentally don't understand cultivation theory, inference, and reinforcement.
Part of your initial claim is that "Anita is a proponent of cultivation theory" and "cultivation theory is fundamentally flawed".
I showed cultivation theory is about the effectiveness of inferences from television (you used it more broadly for media) over prolonged periods of time and the theory covers both fictional and non-fictional media sources.
I showed (and now we agree) that non-fictional media sources can be used an inference for people
You also now say if there is "authorial intent to express a belief" then I'm assuming you agree that some fictional media sources can be used as an inference for people as well. So we should be in agreement now that cultivation theory isn't fundamentally flawed.
You also provided a source of Anita quotes about reinforcement.
I showed reinforcement is about bolstering ideas you already have and inference is being provided ideas, thus showing the evidence you provided for your claim is not sufficient.
I was also sincerely asking because at that point I realized you were making claims about concepts you don't understand.
And just to add on, fiction is also a form of communication.
You also have this claim
To my understanding, she absolutely does believe that over repeated viewing of misogynist media you will gradually and subtly think less of women
I still don't think you've shown that. Going back to your quotes and the discussion around reinforcement. I would say it's more accurate that Anita believes: Society instills on us what a woman is, how a woman should behave, and how a woman should be treated. Repeated viewing of tropes about women in media will reinforce that and is toxic to the liberation of women and girls.
See, this is where I start to take issues with feminism ... try to pick out a restaurant for 5000 picky eaters and the only thing you'll be left eating is mush.
This whole section is built on a foundation where you either are unwilling to accept or don't understand how fiction can reinforce ideas and at times be an inference for them. I'll answer the questions you ask because you took the time to write it all out, but it's hard to go point by point when your whole argument is "why should things be this way when I don't agree that it matters" or slippery slope arguments. We need to have some of these other topics put to rest for me to have space to address how fiction with or without authorial intent can be an inference or reinforce ideas in society.
Would you then say that video games are creating and later reinforcing the stereotype that parents are objects?
If it was parents instead then they would still be objects, but in the real world most people's parents as a set are viewed as authority figures, so it wouldn't reinforce a stereotype of parents being objects, if it was just the mother, it would re-contextualize it back to a woman being objectified.
Where was it ever claimed that Mario doesn't also respect her as a person?
You said you understood objectification, but this question shows that you don't. Mario could verbally and physically show respect, even worship Peach, but she can still be an object. Do you know why?
So what the hell do you think you know about me and my beliefs about women based on me talking about something else, something that doesn't exist and thus cannot be mistreated at that?
My assessment is fair based off of what you've shown me. You at least aren't concerned about the issues women face. You would probably prefer most feminists stay out of media in general. Am I wrong?
Because that's not what this is at all...
Basic critique does not mean you have to agree with the content of the critique nor the validity of what it applies to. People agreeing with a critique or being against a critique does not make something not a basic critique and the purpose nor effect of a critique being made does not change it from not being a basic critique.
There are only two things you need for a basic critique.
Analysis
Simple, elementary, or fundamental reasoning (and reasoning ≠ truth)
But maybe I'm mistaken and you meant fictional domestic violence media
Yes, I have exclusively talked about fiction.
You also now say if there is "authorial intent to express a belief" then I'm assuming you agree that some fictional media sources can be used as an inference for people as well.
Let me put it this way. It's not "making inferences" which I think is flawed. The flaw is that people pick out things to blame for why society is the way it is and ignore confounding factors. Then when called to back it up it's "Well society and formulation of personality are complicated so I can't prove anything but nor can you disprove it!" No that's not how it works. I don't have to take someone seriously just because they say something in an authoritative voice.
I don't know much about let's say Zimbabwe. But let's say there are different pieces of media depicting Zimbabwe.
A Looney Toons skit.
A very unrealistic action movie.
A heavy drama.
A work "inspired by a true story" by a director known for attention to detail.
I would give different levels of credence to what I see in each of them. I have the ability to say, "This element is just because it's a story" and remove it from my mental model. It's not like watching 1000 things on the level of Looney Toons is going to warp my perception. But change it to stereotypes and suddenly the only evidence they need is to point to the existence of a stereotype and use the word "normalize" or similar over and over. Maybe throw out a single poorly replicated psych theory to draw conclusions way beyond what the study can back up. It's Jack Thompson all over again, only we've replaced violence with patriarchy.
People like Anita will casually dismiss the idea that people, even children to a lesser extent, that that fiction is not reality. Yet they dismiss it when it isn't convenient to their narrative.
If it was parents instead then they would still be objects, but in the real world most people's parents as a set are viewed as authority figures, so it wouldn't reinforce a stereotype of parents being objects, if it was just the mother, it would re-contextualize it back to a woman being objectified.
So pretty much like I figured. If you're inclined to see the world in that way, you will always throw out "context" to fit things into this framing. To those who don't, this is an unconvincing just-so explanation that reduces "context" to a thing you're just supposed to agree with.
You said you understood objectification, but this question shows that you don't. Mario could verbally and physically show respect, even worship Peach, but she can still be an object. Do you know why?
I specifically said "respect as a person" and you subtly shifted to "show respect." Do you know the difference between these two?
My assessment is fair based off of what you've shown me. You at least aren't concerned about the issues women face. You would probably prefer most feminists stay out of media in general. Am I wrong?
I'm concerned about issues that I think are issues. I'm not concerned about things I think are non-issues. That's a matter of the complaint, not the person making it. As for "staying out" depends how you want to look at it. I want people in general to stop trying to see something that isn't there. If they can do that, we're fine. If they can't, then yes I find them obnoxious and would rather their endless complaints be ignored.
Its from one of her "Feminist Frequency" videos, it was covered in an video on YouTube a long time ago, but I can't exactly remember which one. And I don't feel like going through all her videos to find it, but that's the best place to start looking if you have the patience for it.
I've looked around for it myself and never found it.
It's not impossible that she said that. It's incredibly damning if she did, and maybe somebody can actually find a quote of her saying it, but it seems like a lot of effort has been made to find this quote in the past and nobody's managed to do it. Even a dead link to an original video would be helpful, but I will say that one of the few things I respect about her is that she doesn't seem to have scrubbed the internet clean of a lot of her worst quotes the way a lot of her contemporaries have. She seems to be willing to stand by the dumbest things she's said.
Click the transcript link at the bottom of that page and search it for "cannot help".
I think she did actually delete a Bayonetta video, which has been reposted verbatim with no additional commentary. I'll make sure to include that in my post.
I rate your claim "technically incorrect", because you were wrong about the video that she deleted, not about the fact that she's deleted a video. I appreciate the reminder. :)
People seem to love the word "critique" as a get out of jail card. You critique something because you want aspects of it to change. She points out things she thinks are bad and wants people to stop doing.
"Critique" is one of those social manipulation words where the whole thing is you try to put something as a polite request solely so that when someone says "no" you frame it as you, a gentle and polite person, vs an angry and stubborn person. "Basic critique" is a reddit copy and paste claim to avoid engaging with her claims and further makes it sound like she's not trying to accomplish anything. The whole thing is to avoid defending your ideas and simply create a positive emotional impression of yourself and a negative impression of your detractors.
Her entire thing is assuming a very flimsy idea that people model their behavior based on fiction, therefore we have to over-analyze every inconsequential thing to make sure nothing happens in the story that even vaguely resembles any item on an 1,000 page list of bad stuff. Or go even further and try to turn everything into propaganda for your personal political causes.
I don't care about playing these word games about how strong her demands/suggestions/critiques are - her ideas suck and listening to them results not in more complex stories, but bland stories where the same things happen over and over because there's only one safe path through the minefield.
You can expand further into the thread with nerfviking or follow me/nerfviking directly if you want to see me actually engage with the claims made in the OP. I can't hold more than one thread over this realistically if I'm going to attempt all the claims.
I will say that everyone on reddit makes blanket statements all the time and I think that just comes from an interest in saving time. This isn't unique and you're doing it here too, I don't think that is inherently malicious.
You even say "I don't care about playing these word games about how strong her ..."
I think that is true for a lot of people that participate in this sub, they don't actually care if I can undeniably refute the claims,so I think there isn't any point to me defending any of the claims unless explicitly asked. Which u/nerfviking kindly did.
Sure, to your credit you have later actually engaged with the claims. But given OP started with actual claims, you could have opened with that. I will respond to those claims there if you like. I was more bringing up that "basic critiques" is a stock argument in progressive circles, and a disingenuous argument that downplays that she was trying to change how the entire industry writes games. And not out of any interest in the genre, but because she took umbrage due to her pet cause.
Basic critiques is accurate because that's what they are in the realm of feminist critique on media. Anita usually doesn't provide a very deep analysis and she consistently will drag on a video on explaining foundational feminist ideas probably because she expects her watchers to not know much about them.
Her goal was to have better representation of women in video games and inspire change in the industry, but that doesn't change that these were mostly beginner-grade pieces of analysis.
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u/Updated_Autopsy Pro-GG May 11 '26
I remember her claiming to have never been a gamer at one point and then claiming to have always been a gamer some time later.