Complaints about Sarkeesian disabling Youtube comments

[gremcint]

Oh my god this point just won't die, it's presented as some sort of supergenius, silver bullet, super point that somehow discredits Anita Sarkeesian's arguments. Basically this woman who wanted to do a simple web series about how women are treated in video games. Then the internet decided this meant she was the devil and harassed her even going so far as to make a video game where you can beat her face until it's black and blue and sending rape and murder threats. Then the people on the internet without their head up their ass turned around and gave her tons of money in support. She only asked for 6000 and got 158000 thousand. She has currently put out 2 videos and some points keep coming up as criticism.

The one point that is really stupid and I hear from every dumbass who wants attention is that she disabled the comments on her youtube videos as though that means everything she says is invalid.

Here's the thing, there's this beach near where I live where I used to swim a lot. The swimming area is roped off and if you were to go outside the roped off area you'd be in this area where the dirt underneath felt different it was all soft, mucky and gross and you were never sure what you stepping on or what would cling to your foot, not to mention the gross seaweed that accumulated outside of the ropes. The vast majority of youtube commenters occupy this location in the genepool of the internet and aren't worth discussing anything with.

Her disabling the comments was probably the smartest thing ever, her twitter and facebook are both still open for discussion but no this one example here means she is completely closed off to discussion.

I'm not even starting on the "why does she need 158000" argument (she only asked for 6 you dumbass).

[Kheldarson]

I'd say it's more an annoyance point, particularly given that she doesn't link any way to, you know, actually discuss her videos with her videos. That's kind of a problem in and of itself.

My bigger issue with her videos is, really, two--no, wait, the third's coming soon-- videos to discuss a trope that we know is in the medium and is a standard grab-me trope across mediums? And you're really going to spend a whole video on discussing the early games which had limited space and time for anything beyond a quick grab me hook point? Should've combined the two videos honestly.

Her points so far are repetitive and she often references games in a way that make me wonder if she's actually played them (original Final Fantasy and Kingdom Hearts as being damsel in distress examples? Please. FF had an intro quest with a princess that wasn't even addressed after the fact, and if anybody wants to argue that Kairi was Sora's main goal in KH, then I wonder what game you were playing.)

There are so many other tropes that are pernicious to the medium in terms of style and choices (how women look to why the f**k do most girls in FF have to be casters??), that I can't help but wonder why she's belaboring so much over a storytelling trope, that, even by her own admission, is common throughout the ages.

[gremcint]

I think she's played the majority of them but to go through all of them would take forever. As for the repetitive points I find it actually reinforces her argument when she's able to list off that many games with that basic premise it helps show how systemic it is.

Also I think a lot of people have their expectations set a little too high for the series, she wanted to do some simple videos then got caught in this maelstrom.

[Kheldarson]

I don't disagree with the latter, but then again, what I've seen of her Kickstarter campaign, she also seemed to advertise this as being a massive project, hence why she needed funding. If you're promising massive, then you need to deliver. On that premise alone, she's falling kind of flat.

And while it does enforce the systemic nature, you still could do that, again, in one video encompassing the full time line. Also, by bringing up some very specific examples of where it's done horrifically wrong to areas where it's used as a simple hook device and acknowledge that as well. As it is, her repetitive point without being very concrete detracts from her argument and makes it seem like she's haranguing the audience.

And maybe she is. I get the feeling that I, as a female gamer, am not in her core audience, which doesn't make sense as I am a gamer. I actually don't mind a well-written damsel in distress story with a white knight to save the girl, because, heck, that's a major romantic fantasy for me, and for a number of my female friends. I'm not going to diss the damsel in distress trope overall because there's a reason why it ends up working and being used: it tends to have a play in male/female relationships (protector vs protected, ymmv in your own relationship). And yet, she won't allow for the more positive or realistic role of the trope; again, to the detriment of her argument. You always address the other side of the argument, even if your intent is to disprove it. She hasn't done it yet.

[gremcint]

well at the time 6000 probably was a massive project compared to her regular series, as for the splitting into videos I could go either way on that she's probably trying to flesh it out more to give the series more substance because of everything.

[Hyena Dandy]

I get the feeling that I, as a female gamer, am not in her core audience, which doesn't make sense as I am a gamer.

I actually agree with you. As I understand the videos, from what I've seen, it's less of an 'Address to gamers' and more of a quick introduction to feminist ideas. Whether or not that's what she means, and whether or not she succeeds, I'm not sure. But from how the videos are set up, that seems to be the case.

I think that people misunderstood her intentions, to make this a grand indictment of the games... When it was really more of a "These are some things feminists talk about," and it's addressed to games because that's something that many people know about.

I think that this is kind of her fault, though. The way her Kickstarter campaign was written, it certainly came off as "I'm going to do an in-depth study of videogames and feminism, and it's going to be very serious, academic work." Instead it seems more "These are feminist ideas, I am presenting using videogames."

Additionally, I think you misunderstand the complaint about the damsel in distress thing. The problem isn't that ANY games are like that. It's HOW MANY games are like that. I'm a gay gamer, and I don't have a problem with the fact that some games don't have gay romances in them. My problem is with how FEW games have gay characters. Aside from Skyrim, and the Bioware titles... It's very hard to think off the top of my head of a game that lets me choose to play a gay character. I guess The Sims, but The Sims I have to keep making people be gay, and then the gay happens on its own. Otherwise, the game will be gayness-free.

Similarly, the fact that black characters in movies/tv are not in relationships with white characters is not a problem. But how OFTEN black characters aren't paired with whites is. Off the top of my head, I can think of Worf and Jadzia Dax on DS9, and two minor characters in Dredd. There are definitely more, but it's hard to think of off the top of my head.

I do, however, feel that she didn't properly make that point, that the issue is frequency over presence.

Overall, the videos I've seen have seemed a bit... Bland. Inoffensive bordering on boring.

[D_Yeti_Esquire]

Privilege Check: I'm playing with all of 'em being a cis-gendered white heterosexual male. The only reason I'd ever include that information is the topic itself seems to require that. I have also watched the entirety of both videos and was aware of the story and the backlash.

I'm going to take the South Park view of it in that Anita for better or worse through her Feminist Frequency series which has more than just this set of videos starts with a political conclusion and fills in her point. So the polemic discourse she has, you know the one where people on one side call her names and threaten her and on the other she gets "Shut up and take my money" to the point of absurdity and the blog activism support of sites like Jezebel is the field of play she's chosen to play in. I view people on both sides as I've seen this play out as being the same type of person, although I view the detractors as being far more stupid and vile. Then again, I also have been known to frequent Jezebel so I've seen plenty of the opposite. Their most recent Michael Douglas story made me laugh.

But the videos themselves can be infuriating. If you follow radical (specifically relating to fundamental need for societal change) feminist discourse and understand the concepts, what she put out there makes sense. In cases it's completely unsubstantiated within her own video series, but it makes sense. For example, video two continually along with showing the repetitive nature of violence against women tropes in the games then ties that to violence against women. Since the most recent studies find no ties between violent video game playing and violence in general, it doesn't make sense. However, IF you consider it in line with considering other pop culture such as music and movies critically and how it ties to a patriarchal society, it does. It's the same logic applied to a different medium. If you are unaware of the background it leads to a WTF and "she's attacking my games!"

As a man, the second half of her 2nd video is the most effective which warps the damsel in distress/fridge dynamic and then throws sacrifice and "asking for it" on top of it. I'm a story person so I don't find that to be a story you can't tell philosophically (the pyrric victory applied to the Damsel in Distress), but its frequency is disturbing.

To me, it speaks more to the game industry is overly dependent on male straight male protagonists in general which limits the tropes and leads to overuse. The sin is how cliche they are. And I've played gay protagonists through RPGs and plenty of women. They're there. I just tend to believe that tropes in general tend to flow from the demographic aspects of the protagonists more often then not. So by invalidating those tropes, you somewhat antagonize the demographic those protagonists represent.

Heart of the Swarm for example fridges Jim Raynor. So a lot of these tropes are simply part and parcel of gaming mechanics (we need a goal to emotionally tie the player) + the assumed sex of the player.

That said, I'm happy the series exists as I've learned a bit more than I did about more recent games. I just think it's not genuine to publish something that is by nature political AND use the crazies that follow as a shield for shutting off discourse. What she's experiencing isn't anything the Barack Obama, LeBron James, and Modern Primate guy haven't already experienced. And she has probably exacerbated the response by shutting off YouTube comments because that probably would have kept many from going after her directly. If she were making these videos for the undecided, they would start at a lower 101 level. Her audience is who gave her 100+K to make these videos. That's why we see this.

[Kheldarson]

I actually agree with you. As I understand the videos, from what I've seen, it's less of an 'Address to gamers' and more of a quick introduction to feminist ideas. Whether or not that's what she means, and whether or not she succeeds, I'm not sure. But from how the videos are set up, that seems to be the case.

That actually makes sense. Wish she'd actually state that though.

I think that this is kind of her fault, though. The way her Kickstarter campaign was written, it certainly came off as "I'm going to do an in-depth study of videogames and feminism, and it's going to be very serious, academic work." Instead it seems more "These are feminist ideas, I am presenting using videogames."

That's exactly it! She says she's doing this big work about feminism and gaming but we're just getting a biased overview. I keep thinking, "She's got a great argumentative point, but she's not addressing it properly in favor of rhetoric!"

Additionally, I think you misunderstand the complaint about the damsel in distress thing. The problem isn't that ANY games are like that. It's HOW MANY games are like that.

[quoteI do, however, feel that she didn't properly make that point, that the issue is frequency over presence.[/quote]

I get the point, but like you said, it isn't presented well. She keeps talking about how it's used, not the amount it's used. The first video could've been about the ways the tropes have been used in past and modern games, including her combo tropes, and then used a second video to discuss the frequency in which the trope is used. A good way to have done that would be to pick a genre and stack games that use the trope vs. those that don't. That she knows of, at least. That would've been effective.

Privilege Check: I'm playing with all of 'em being a cis-gendered white heterosexual male. The only reason I'd ever include that information is the topic itself seems to require that. I have also watched the entirety of both videos and was aware of the story and the backlash.

Think the last sentence is more relevant than the first imho . I'll admit that I only believe background of a person is only relevant in defining what biases you're bringing to the table.

I'm going to take the South Park view of it in that Anita for better or worse through her Feminist Frequency series which has more than just this set of videos starts with a political conclusion and fills in her point.

OMG THIS. This is what's infuriating me. Thank you for pinpointing it.

For example, video two continually along with showing the repetitive nature of violence against women tropes in the games then ties that to violence against women. Since the most recent studies find no ties between violent video game playing and violence in general, it doesn't make sense. However, IF you consider it in line with considering other pop culture such as music and movies critically and how it ties to a patriarchal society, it does. It's the same logic applied to a different medium. If you are unaware of the background it leads to a WTF and "she's attacking my games!"

That's actually what I thought. Kabe and I were watching it, and I had to pause after her statements about gamers, women, and "asking for it". I was just like, "Seriously? You're going to link domestic violence to video games?!"

To me, it speaks more to the game industry is overly dependent on male straight male protagonists in general which limits the tropes and leads to overuse. The sin is how cliche they are. And I've played gay protagonists through RPGs and plenty of women. They're there. I just tend to believe that tropes in general tend to flow from the demographic aspects of the protagonists more often then not. So by invalidating those tropes, you somewhat antagonize the demographic those protagonists represent.

Here's where I'm inclined to agree and disagree with you. On the one hand, yes, the use of this trope falls directly on the fact that the view of the developers is that their core audience is still teenage males. On the other, even as a woman, I have a deep romantic love of the Damsel in Distress trope. I like the romanticism of a white knight coming to save the day. That's why it's still an effective trope in media today, to an extent. That's part of why her video bugs me, because, again, it's not addressing the other side of the argument which is why is it an effective trope to begin with, if not vastly overused.

I just think it's not genuine to publish something that is by nature political AND use the crazies that follow as a shield for shutting off discourse. What she's experiencing isn't anything the Barack Obama, LeBron James, and Modern Primate guy haven't already experienced. And she has probably exacerbated the response by shutting off YouTube comments because that probably would have kept many from going after her directly. If she were making these videos for the undecided, they would start at a lower 101 level. Her audience is who gave her 100+K to make these videos. That's why we see this.

And that's where the last bit of complaint is. You made points, let others give you rebuttal. That's the strength of an argument. Heck, she could make a fourth video on this topic just addressing counter arguments. That would be brilliant. Instead of hiding behind the lack of commentary.