Uh...I was expecting the Earthworm Jim guy to be a pedophile or something. But he's just a homophobe? Is the game homophobic? Come on Jim, man up - death of the author and all that (fallacy of negative association)

Completely disagree.

The -ism critics DO want to take away the games. Maybe not the whole full games, but they definitely at least want to rip away those 'potentially offensive' pieces. They want to make games docile, inoffensive to anyone, fully politically correct and boring.

Films have this problem to a degree as well, yet nobody calls for scaling down books, paintings or other 'classic' art.

It's actually offensive for games when those critics criticize the games for having this or that content. No, they don't have to like it. I can understand they may not like some content, but yes, the most vocal critics do want to censor games for the silliest reasons.

As long as there isn't a law against it there is nothing wrong with games depicting acts of violence, sexual acts, blood fountains, extremely sexed up characters or anything along those lines and even games like Postal 2 or Manhunt are able to exist and are often even living off of the "controversy".
There is also not much wrong with a bloodied bust in an entirely optional version of a game, especially when it's limited to Europe and 8000 copies. You don't have to buy it if you don't like it. Just as much as you don't have to participate in celebrating Halloween.
None of these games or parts of games are "bad" in any way or form, they're just not for you and just because you and a number of people don't like them or feel "offended" by them doesn't mean that every game should be designed to fit some sort of universal "politically correct" vision that everyone can agree to.

Games depicting virtual characters a certain way will make people mistreat these group of people in real life about as much as violent games will make people go out on a killing spree. (I believe not long ago Sterling brought up this exact point in one of his videos that virtual violence has not much in common with real violence...)

You can go ahead and complain, but at some point you shouldn't be wondering if people are telling you to shut up because what you are saying is bordering on stupidity or even further than that put you on the same level with the kind of people running around in front of a game convention with signs telling everyone that games will send them to hell or groups of "concerned mothers" saying that violent video games will ruin the youth forever and ever.

Other than that, you will excuse me if I think that Jim Sterling is yet again not really voicing his actual opinion on the matter, but jumping on the latest bandwagon to what people want to be hearing as his new reformed self.
At least based on past conversations he's had with actual people and his manner of expression I'd rather not repeat here myself: http://borderhouseblog.com/?p=4298

Phasmal:

Zombine3D:

minimacker:
Having sex with many men in a medieval high-fantasy?

This is what popped in my head when I saw this video.

This game has dragons, magic, furries and people who will marry me because I'm wearing a certain kind of necklace.
I am absolutely sure the lack of slut shaming would not destroy the `realism`.

Because if we dare to include these topics in games, NEXT IT WILL AFFECT CHILDREN'S MINDS AND THEY WILL THINK...blah, blah, blah,

We often here this kind of bullshit from people going on about violence.

Having thou cake and eating it?

If we start being censorial with games where will it end? Where will the lines be drawn?

I'm surprised Earthworm Jimothy didn't mention Lollipop Chainsaw...as an example along with Tomb Raider, Hitman etc. etc.

Captcha: Blaze a trail

Indeed.

Moth_Monk:

Because if we dare to include these topics in games, NEXT IT WILL AFFECT CHILDREN'S MINDS AND THEY WILL THINK...blah, blah, blah,

We often here this kind of bullshit from people going on about violence.

Having thou cake and eating it?

If we start being censorial with games where will it end? Where will the lines be drawn?

That sure was some words you said.
Pity they had no connection to anything I said.

It's a stupid thing to include with the general atmosphere of Skyrim.
I can be a Dragonborne lady, I can marry someone of the same gender, arguing that it's correct for Skyrim's society to include that quest just seems bloody silly.
Saying it's `medievial` doesn't make sense.

That was my actual point, by the way.
You seem to have missed it.

Oh I didn't know MDF was you, Jim. I'll go check it out.

As for the zombie-boob statue: I've said it before, I'll say it again. Why does everything need to have a pair of boobs strapped to the front? If I want to watch porn, I'll watch porn. I don't need shameless shots of the female characters' massive boobage (or assage, I'm not biased) every ten minutes to remind me of what I'm missing by spending hours playing the game.

One of the first videos where I have to say I disagree with Jim.

Not really because he's wrong about there being idiots who take any sort of criticism as the idea that someone's trying to take their games away and must thus be shut up, those definitely exist.

But rather because misrepresents the entire argument about whether or not certain things are sexist as everyone who disagrees on something being sexist being that sort of idiot.

Just because something can be interpreted as sexist does not mean it has to be. If you're out looking for it you can find sexism, racism etc. EVERYWHERE. It does not mean that's actually the case. It's perfectly possible to disagree that certain things are sexist and to find those that do find them sexist to be overly sensitive without trying to shut up all criticism out of fear of your favorite games being taken away.

Jim tries to stop things turning black and white by turning them into a different kind of black and white, that doesn't really make things better.

wizzy555:

Frankly both are silly, the presence of some egalitarian memes doesn't mean that the philosophy in skyrim resembles current social justice philosophy (btw, not all feminist philosophies dislike slut shaming). The writers say this is the culture in skyrim, so apparently it is.

To be clear, I'm not debating the relevancy of that quest at all.
What I am debating is the attitude that `of course things should be that way, medieval!!!`.
Seeing as that isn't how the culture of Skyrim comes across and short of that quest there is no reason at all to think that women in that culture are looked down on for having sex.
(And I don't care what some `feminist philosophies` think, shaming women for having sex is fucked up).

Thank God for shameless self promotion, too, ey Jim?

Phasmal:

Moth_Monk:

Because if we dare to include these topics in games, NEXT IT WILL AFFECT CHILDREN'S MINDS AND THEY WILL THINK...blah, blah, blah,

We often here this kind of bullshit from people going on about violence.

Having thou cake and eating it?

If we start being censorial with games where will it end? Where will the lines be drawn?

That sure was some words you said.
Pity they had no connection to anything I said.

It's a stupid thing to include with the general atmosphere of Skyrim.
I can be a Dragonborne lady, I can marry someone of the same gender, arguing that it's correct for Skyrim's society to include that quest just seems bloody silly.
Saying it's `medievial` doesn't make sense.

That was my actual point, by the way.
You seem to have missed it.

So you don't think the player should be given the opportunity to act like an immoral prick in the game? In anyway? The player gets to murder and eat people, and they don't get to be sexist? Come on. "I might be a psychopathic, cannibal assassin who worships a corpse; but at least I respect women!"

Surely you can see how silly that is? Having X in a game does not equal the promotion or endorsement of X. We should be allowed to fantasize or are you one of the thought police?

Callate:

wizzy555:
Eh? The dragonborne can be a woman, and the master wizard was a woman. The rank below arch-mage.

The Dragonborn can be a woman, but Prell's repeated thesis in the article is that in spite of the presence of a woman who would be the obvious candidate to take over the vacated leadership role, the mantle is passed on to the PC instead. While there are female characters who could have become Archmage instead of the Dragonborn, there isn't (in my experience) any inherent suggestion that the role would more naturally pass to Faralda, Nirya, or Mirabelle than to Tolfdir, Phinis, or Urag.

That's not because the player is presumed to be male.

It's got nothing to do with gender.

It's because the player is THE CHOSEN ONE who's automatically better at everything than everyone else.

There's no suggestion it would pass to anyone but the player because the entire game, from the ground up, is designed to have the player as the ultimate hero of everything. There's not a single actually competent leader in the entire game who can take care of things themselves, the player is required to do EVERYTHING because that's how the game is designed. You're the chosen hero and by design absolutely nobody else is.

There's not a single male leader of your likes either. Ulfric can't win the war without you. Kodlak can't cure his lycanthropy without you. General Tullius can't beat down the rebellion without you. Not a single Yarl can defend his hold without you. Brynjolf can't bring the Thieves Guild back to glory without you. The Greybeards can't stop Alduin without you.

Nobody in the entire continent of Skyrim is capable of achieving anything, not even farming their own fields, without you the chosen hero.

It feels to me like part of the issue stems from the fact that the medium is still viewed by the general public and most of us gamers as immature. For a lot of people, gaming is still a guilt-free, 100% escapism activity for them. This is their me-time to temporarily allow themselves to act as Neanderthals and huge dicks - or inversely, to be the best and most helpful person they *can't* be in Real Life. Games are where you can try and reinforce that childhood naïveté that friendship and love both fix everything.

For others, the medium is evolving. Games are turning into a valid medium to approach those "isms", to confront and analyze them. I think that's commendable. We need a game where you play a Black slave first suffering under the clutches of his masters and who then frees himself. We need a game with an openly gay protagonist. We need games to tackle both religion and science head-on, if these questions are ever to evolve. I'm not saying the future of these cultural tropes and elements rests solely on the shoulder of game devs, but we do have a sizable contribution to offer.

The problem is, Group A is still larger than Group B. Group A thinks any kind of serious discussion runs the risk of forcing the conservatives and fearful sorts to turn games development itself into an illegal activity, or they've got blinders on. Sexism in Skyrim? You bet your ass there's sexism in it. Mikael, the bard in Whiterun? Textbook macho prick if there ever was one. Of course there's meek Elves and burly Orcs and Viking-esque humans loving themselves some good Xena Warrior Princess types. The whole freaking game is a giant stereotype! That doesn't stop me from loving it!

Some games have definite problems in their scenario, in their world-building or in their intrinsic concepts. If only we could understand that, we'd be done with these outcries. We won't ever go past that, however, because there's always going to be petulant article-skimmers itching to spew their misdirected rage at articles they only barely took the time to read.

This goes both ways, too. Remember the "Sex-Box" controversy? A lot of right-wing pundits are aching for views and general notability and might be so removed from the gaming scene that they don't care if they rustle the jimmies of a few joystick-twiddling nobodies. If you're in that situation, what do you do? You pick the easiest target and do your job as a good, thoughtless demagogue.

Next time you're offended by something on the gaming scene, read up on it first. Curb your initial instincts to just find the OP and blast him. Try and look at your offending issue from both sides of the coin. Just try.

That's going to prove the naysayers that yes, gamers can have mature discussions.

Moth_Monk:

So you don't think the player should be given the opportunity to act like an immoral prick in the game? In anyway? The player gets to murder and eat people, and they don't get to be sexist? Come on. "I might be a psychopathic, cannibal assassin who worships a corpse; but at least I respect women!"

Surely you can see how silly that is? Having X in a game does not equal the promotion or endorsement of X. We should be allowed to fantasize or are you one of the thought police?

Once again, while I may find a particular quest in bad taste or not wasn't the point of my post.
The point of my post was to highlight to people that saying `of course it's that way, it's a medieval society!` is wrong, considering that it isn't in line with the rest of the game.
I don't give a donkey's bollocks what you fantasize about.*

*EDIT: Expanding on that, whether or not the game should allow you to be x y and z is a matter I think game designers should think carefully about. But what with the actual community surrounding games being pretty damn sexist, personally if I were a dev I would just avoid it altogether.
Further, do you reckon games should have a sexist quest, a racist quest, a whatever quest, just to give you the `option` of doing it?

Yopaz:

JudgeGame:

Yopaz:
I have to say I agree with the point that the people discussing are on extreme sides of each other. However the internet doesn't have a middle ground. You're either black or white, there's no grey in the middle or any other colour somewhere in the equation.

This is part of the reason there's so much hostility towards feminists. Extreme feminism inspires extreme misogyny. I tend to stay away from all sexism, feminism and homophobia debates because I don't get along with either extreme side and I don't want to be associated with either side.

You only choose to believe that. Your view is not representative of the reality.

Yeah, this is nothing but my interpretation judging forum debates. I wont deny that or claim that this is representative. Was really my idle speculation worthy to try to start a discussion? Thank you for proving me right for trying to stay out of these things though.

I can say from my own experience that there are a lot of internal arguments among feminists and there groups that have radically different goals. As an example, feminists argue a lot about whether prostitution is defendible or the treatment and respect transsexual women (and men) deserve.

As another more direct example, nobody (who is sane and progressive) is actually claiming that Django Unchained is 100% negative and racist. A lot of people feel there are problematic details that shouldn't be ignored. Knowledge is power and understanding what it is you are seeing and hearing gives you the power over how it affects you. If people choose to dismiss any possibility that a film can carry (unintended) racist ideas, the only thing they can do is accept those racist ideas as undisputed arguments towards racism. Django isn't a racist film, but if you don't question what it is you have just watched, it might as well have been racist.

What i took away from this video is that there exists people who didn´t find a statue of a decapitated corpse in bad taste and even went so far as to get angry that people were offended... What the hell?

MrBaskerville:
What i took away from this video is that there exists people who didn´t find a statue of a decapitated corpse in bad taste and even went so far as to get angry that people were offended... What the hell?

But dude, it's a zombie game! If we let filthy feminists take away a bloodied torso with terribly-molded tits, what next? I guess we can't have zombies OR tits, EVER! (heavy sarcasm.)

(There, I saved you guys time.)

Phasmal:

Moth_Monk:

So you don't think the player should be given the opportunity to act like an immoral prick in the game? In anyway? The player gets to murder and eat people, and they don't get to be sexist? Come on. "I might be a psychopathic, cannibal assassin who worships a corpse; but at least I respect women!"

Surely you can see how silly that is? Having X in a game does not equal the promotion or endorsement of X. We should be allowed to fantasize or are you one of the thought police?

Once again, while I may find a particular quest in bad taste or not wasn't the point of my post.
The point of my post was to highlight to people that saying `of course it's that way, it's a medieval society!` is wrong, considering that it isn't in line with the rest of the game.
I don't give a donkey's bollocks what you fantasize about.*

*EDIT: Expanding on that, whether or not the game should allow you to be x y and z is a matter I think game designers should think carefully about. But what with the actual community surrounding games being pretty damn sexist, personally if I were a dev I would just avoid it altogether.
Further, do you reckon games should have a sexist quest, a racist quest, a whatever quest, just to give you the `option` of doing it?

Yeah absolutely. It's supposed to be "live another life in another world" the player should have as much freedom as the devs can put in. Consider the Fable series of games, where you can go on gun rampages in towns. I did that all the time. It seems unusual to me for people to complain about being allowed to be sexist but think that it's fine to be a mass murdering cannibal. All virtually of course.

If I'm allowed to shoot up a town in a video game, why shouldn't I also be allowed to be sexist?

I don't agree that having sexism in a game makes the game sexist.

There's a lot of racism in the Witcher, Dragon age, and Djanjo for that matter, that doesn't make them racists game or movies.

I also don't agree that your example from Skyrim is a particularly compelling example of sexism in the game.
As far as I remember from the game that quest was far more about sexual liberation vs sexual conservatism, in fact in the world of Skyrim its also more about the moral guidelines of one religious dogma vs another. One which embraces sexuality as a means to praise their deity, Dibella, and another which sees that as some kind of immoral behaviour (I know which religion I'd rather sign up with.)

The quest would have worked just as well if either or both had been men, although I don't doubt if the prude had been a man and the dibella worshipper had been a woman how would people have considered it then, or if the prude had been a woman and the dibella worshipper a man. Or if the NPCs had been randomly generated and differed for each person who played the game, we would have still had cries of sexism. Supposition only, no conclusion drawn.

As for that zombie woman torso, I don't know if I'd consider it sexist, I mean there wasn't a zombie man torso available in other boxes so perhaps it is, but I do know I found it grotesque, I felt the same way about their trailer for that matter.

Edit additional: I also think that the inclusion of such things is good for the games, it allows discussion of these subjects. Consider the insanely misogynistic Ceasar's legion from Fallout: NV, also a good example of the difference between a misogynistic culture and a sexist one, the legion -really- fucking hates women. However, by including these aspects and giving the player a choice in how they interact with these characters allows for a person to explore their own moral philosophy through the typical Socratic form.

I however have never managed to do a pro legion play through though, those guys are not even evil in a fun way like dungeon keeper is.

Edit: correction supposition, not observation.

As a massive HP Lovecraft fan, Jim... Thanks for perfectly articulating much of what I have already known for a while now, but have been unable to express so eloquently. Truly Jim, we should thank God for someone as great as you. :D

Moth_Monk:

Phasmal:

Moth_Monk:

So you don't think the player should be given the opportunity to act like an immoral prick in the game? In anyway? The player gets to murder and eat people, and they don't get to be sexist? Come on. "I might be a psychopathic, cannibal assassin who worships a corpse; but at least I respect women!"

Surely you can see how silly that is? Having X in a game does not equal the promotion or endorsement of X. We should be allowed to fantasize or are you one of the thought police?

Once again, while I may find a particular quest in bad taste or not wasn't the point of my post.
The point of my post was to highlight to people that saying `of course it's that way, it's a medieval society!` is wrong, considering that it isn't in line with the rest of the game.
I don't give a donkey's bollocks what you fantasize about.*

*EDIT: Expanding on that, whether or not the game should allow you to be x y and z is a matter I think game designers should think carefully about. But what with the actual community surrounding games being pretty damn sexist, personally if I were a dev I would just avoid it altogether.
Further, do you reckon games should have a sexist quest, a racist quest, a whatever quest, just to give you the `option` of doing it?

Yeah absolutely. It's supposed to be "live another life in another world" the player should have as much freedom as the devs can put in. Consider the Fable series of games, where you can go on gun rampages in towns. I did that all the time. It seems unusual to me for people to complain about being allowed to be sexist but think that it's fine to be a mass murdering cannibal. All virtually of course.

If I'm allowed to shoot up a town in a video game, why shouldn't I also be allowed to be sexist?

Remember how you got fined and arrested in that game? Remember the little bar that counts the evil points you are accumulating? There is such a thing in fiction as tone and perspective and it is one of the creator's most powerful and fundamental skills. I'm not even saying what Fable did was clever or anything; it was bloody obvious and the bear minimum you expect from fiction you are expected to take seriously.

Yes, this so much.

I'm sick and tired of people going "You want to ban everything fun! Our freedom of speech is under attack!", if I criticise anything for being sexist or homophobic.

alphamalet:

Personally, I don't feel as though game developers should be under a moral obligation to include gender-progressive roles for female, or male characters. So long as a game isn't propagating backwards gender roles, and the more "offensive" gender roles are fitting in the larger context of the game, I don't see an issue.

It's true they don't have the obligation, but that doesn't mean they can't be criticised for it. Or that people shouldnn't voice what they'd like to see in games.
I mean, the game developers aren't under a moral oblication to make good games either, or certain types of games.

Also, I'm not sure what you mean by the 'offensive' gender roles being fitting in the context of the game.
I mean, obviously you can have offensive stuff in a work, in fact art shouldn't shy away from that kind of stuff, but it will depend then how it's handled, and what the message of the work is.

Legion:
It used to be a case of unless something was deliberately and obviously trying to be offensive, it was taken as a joke, or seen as light hearted banter.

Also, a lot of minorities just took the abuse.

Besides, I think it's more vital to point out sexism and such stuff when it isn't trying to be offensive.
If someone doesn't realise s/he is being offensive, or has certain kinds of attitudes, isn't it good to inform them of it? To challenge accepted norms and our own attitudes?

For example, my grandmother calls black people 'niggers'.
She doesn't mean anything bad by it, when she was young, that was just the way people talked.
But I'm going to do my best to try to make her stop using that word, because it's meaning is different for most people.

wizzy555:

Dexter111:

Other than that, you will excuse me if I think that Jim Sterling is yet again not really voicing his actual opinion on the matter, but jumping on the latest bandwagon to what people want to be hearing as his new reformed self.
At least based on past conversations he's had with actual people and his manner of expression I'd rather not repeat here myself: http://borderhouseblog.com/?p=4298

Thanks I suddenly understand why Jim has made a 180 degree turn since his 1st videos.

This is pretty old news. As a fan who follows the rest of his work on Destructoid, Jim has a lot of reasons for his views, the debacle with Daphny being a small part of them. Almost everything that ends up on Jimquisition originates in discussions he has on the Destructiod podcast in his free time and has little to do with any higher agenda, just the views of him and his close friends and lover.

Zachary Amaranth:
On that note, we really don't have games that equate to Huck Finn in terms of actual content. When a game is racist, it's generally just racist. And you know the funny thing? The people who bring it up most are gamers, the same gamers who don't call for the banning of such games.

And the reason we don't have it is because people are afraid to try, because on the one hand, there are people who will cry whatever on it and try to get it run into the ground without bothering to think about it's intent and on the other, you have the damned trolls who will make the situation worse by making all gamers look like fratboy douchebags who think that these things are funny and they should be allowed to indulge in it without anybody calling them out on what they are.

And the reason we don't call for bans is because that's not something wise people do. I don't care what kind of horrible shit is made into games, movies, TV, whatever (and there's a lot of horrible shit that has been made), you don't ban things. As soon as you start down that road, you open the door for anything to be banned regardless of message or content just because popular opinion disagrees with it.

The recaptcha is "Hear me roar!" I wonder if these things are gaining a certain amount of sentience.

Legion:

wizzy555:
People don't seem to understand that not all stories are moral messages. Skyrim has a mission to abduct a priest into a cannibal cult and EAT him, this is not a "pro-cannibal" message. Like-wise the "slut-shaming" quest in skyrim is not "pro slut-shaming". Skyrim is a true RPG in that it gives you the option to be entirely unethical but lets you stop and do something else should you decide to.

This is my issue as well.

Why is violence not seen to have a "point" or a "message"? We don't look at quests asking you to butcher innocent people and say "This game is condoning violence" so how is it any different from it being sexist, racist or homophobic (unless it is openly promoting it).

That's not to say I think you should be able to be them three things, my point is that when it comes to violence it's "just a game", but when it's a controversial subject that doesn't involve dismembering fictional characters but insulting them, suddenly it's bad.

ccdohl:

In my case, I'm just tired of hearing about how sexist or misogynistic or racist or homophobic everything is. It seems like people will dig to find offense in any piece of media, even if it reflects cultural norms accurately, and I'm just kind of tired of it.

This too.

It almost feels like people are going out of their way to try and find as many things offensive as possible to show how empathetic and open minded they are. It used to be a case of unless something was deliberately and obviously trying to be offensive, it was taken as a joke, or seen as light hearted banter.

I'm with you. Having a wank on a blank canvas isn't media. If you aren't prepared to give an opinion on your own work, you are nothing but a coward.

Thank you, Jim!

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

I was thinking of writing a blog post about this (a forum post was clearly out of the question), explaining that many of my favorite games had sexist/racist/homophobic content, and that that was a bad thing, but that they were still good games. I'm fine with taking baby steps when it comes to these kinds of issues, since that's the only way these things are ever solved.

Even some of my favorite shows (Sherlock and Firefly) have some terrible problems with women and Asian people in particular, which makes me very uncomfortable and I wish they didn't have those problems, but I still love both shows overall.

I really hope that this video makes people more willing to discuss these issues and work toward fixing them rather than screaming, plugging their ears, and insulting everyone out of defensiveness. I'm too scared to read the comments here to see if your video has had the intended effect because doing that tends to ruin my day, I just wanted to express my gratitude. Thank you so much.