Buretsu:

Kahunaburger:

LastGreatBlasphemer:
This Kickstarter NEEDS horrendous people making these posts. Because this kickstarter NEEDS to fail.

You're about $45,000 too late haha.

Because all one has to do is say "Sexism" and...

Because throwing money at a problem is easier than trying to acknowledge it.

Well, considering that the entire point of this project is to educate (and it's part of a larger effort to express feminist theory in an accessible manner to non-academics) I'm having a hard time seeing where you're coming from here.

LastGreatBlasphemer:

1) Ignoring it and hoping it goes away is how Bush landed his second term as president. It's not a realistic option. If this kick starter succeeds, and it's just what we think it is, then this lady got a shit ton of money, to tell us what we could find for free just about anywhere, and we let her get away with it. It's like Scientology. Crazy book says crazy things. But what those crazy things are, you gotta pay for it.

TOTALLY a broken analogy. Even if you think it's stupid, it doesn't affect you that the video exists. You can't choose to not be affected by who the president is

This isn't really as unusual for the youtube "community" as you seem to think.

Then again, i occasionally go out of my way to read the comments on videos for a good laugh, i'd guess most people just desperately pretend they aren't there.

Well, whatever those commenters on youtube wanted to achieve, I have a slight feeling that it wasn't to make it go viral and the funds to skyrocket. Just a feeling though, might be wrong.

Kapol:

Richardplex:

..Okay, you got me. The video wasn't a good source. I just had that video at the ready, having recently-ish watched it, and I suffered some delicious confirmation bias. I still think his points were valid, badly executed or no.

As for documentaries, I'll have to disagree with you there. Me and my friend link each documentaries, and then discuss them afterwards. My most recent one for example was about the Yakuza, and I'm more educated, and more neutral about them now. The documentary was fairly neutral in my opinion, and it was one of the better ones I've seen because of that neutrality. YMMV is in effect here, but I'd definitely advocate that neutral documentaries make better discussion value, and thus better documentaries.

I'll edit my original post to say it isn't the best of sources..
_{really tempted to just say fuck it and delete everything, I'm exhausted with all these responses...}

I don't disagree that some of the points were valid, even if I don't agree with all of them. It's always too bad when some good points do fall flat due to poor execution. It happens though. It's not like it was anything more then a video for youtube anyways.

For the documentary point, I meant that for documentaries on very opinionated subjects with little proof for either side or some/a lot of evidence for both sides. Documentaries like one on the Yakuza can be a bit less... debateable? Not sure if that's the right word for it. Generally though those documentaries can use facts and actual events rather then using studies and tests that are possibly biased. Sort of like the Mortal Kombat documentary. Though I've heard that was one which was very good at presented both sides, I highly doubt it really changed many opinions.

And sorry if I'm exhasting you more. ^^; At the very least I'd like to thank you for not being an ass in my dealings with you (I say that as I haven't read the other comments much to be honest). I know the feeling of having people just keep quoting you on the same thing over and over and just wanting it to be done. So it's fine to leave it at that if at this if you'd like.

I'm not having to defend myself against someone who I agree with with you, so I have no problem with you quoting me :)

I think I know what you mean - the mention of the word Yakuza doesn't immediately cause people to flare their opinions on the matter like gender equality, violence in videogames or evolution does, so it doesn't elicit the same controversy, despite being a grey issue. I guess the word would be polarising. And yeah, while this 'documentary' covers a polarising issue has what could be seen as facts to it - though of course whether x is a bad female character will be wildly disputed - they aren't bringing anything else to the table, so you just get people bristling with their opinions, unchanging. Really this needs to have how both male and females are stereotypicalised - and I know it's nowhere near as bad for men as it is for women, as Irridium put it so well:

Irridium:
And yeah yeah, men have to conform to stereotypes as well. Because conforming to the stereotype of "saving the world and getting all the fame/money/women" is totally the same thing as "just sit back and let the men handle things".

But still, I think having it in there is required for it to have any credibility whatsoever. Even then though it's fairly pointless.

I think this post is very badly organised, but I'm very tired. So yeah, basically I see what you mean and I agree; documentaries that are neutral and informative only work as discussion value when solid facts are used, with some opinions from relevant people with experience in the matter, and the opinion overall is left to the viewer to decide. Other documentaries that have no hard facts fall back to studies and heresay, and thus fail for discussion value or to sway opinions, and these, along with landmine topics, can't fullfill the function that the former does at being a documentary, and only succeed at making people say "yeah, I still agree with my own opinion".

Edit: also, your reply meant I read the comments. ...I have a feeling I'm going to be heavily wrongly associated here. Why did I post in a minefield of a topic like this and not do my usual generic agreement that misogynists are scum :/

There's no arguing that the video game community is incredibly sexist, I hope that she doesn't let the threats and rude comments discourage her, because she does have a unique opportunity to make a difference. The only thing I don't totally get is why her goal for the kickstarter was so high, $6,000 seems excessive. I know she said she had to pay for games and production value but it still seems like overkill.

Regardless I hope she makes good use of the money, And I REALLY hope that any of the money not going to the videos goes to a good cause and not her own pocket.

Misogyny aside, there really are problems with this Kickstarter.

1) NO ONE IS CENSORING ANYONE

She already has a channel where she does this kind of thing already. All this Kickstarter is for is to pay her for what she's already doing for free

2) Her "analysis" basically consists of naming a trope, displaying a character that embodies the trope and going "Well, there you go." She makes no effort of going beyond that point; no effort to understand WHY these tropes exist. It's journalism in its shallowest form

3) No one is saying you CAN'T contribute to her kickstarter; they are saying that you SHOULDN'T for some of the reasons listed here.

4) This documentary brings nothing new to the discussion and won't likely change anyone's minds. The purpose of this documentary is to confirm the biases held by the filmmaker and those who share their views. There is nothing that prompts discussion and nothing that attempts to understand why women tend to be portrayed less than realistically in games (e.g. Marketing practices that target 15-25 year old men as the primary consumer of games; the negative stereotype of GIRRRL Gamers)

In short, there are reasons why this documentary is a bad idea/redundant/superfluous that have nothing to do with the creator's sex or gender. It has everything to do with people funding an ego trip that won't effect any change and won't do anything beyond make the creator richer

Like I said, no on is saying that you can't support this project. We're saying that better projects and more valid attempts at understanding women in games should be supported; egocentric confirmation bias should not be.

Buretsu:

Kahunaburger:

Buretsu:

Because all one has to do is say "Sexism" and...

Because throwing money at a problem is easier than trying to acknowledge it.

Well, considering that the entire point of this project is to educate (and it's part of a larger effort to express feminist theory in an accessible manner to non-academics) I'm having a hard time seeing where you're coming from here.

There's a chance I'm wrong, but I fully expect the entire point will be to educate about how horrible men are and how badly we stereotype women, and how ashamed we should feel about ourselves as a result.

Never mind that a man isn't considered a man unless he shoots first and asks questions later, screws the rules, and has the emotional range of an enraged howler monkey, what really matters is that a woman isn't considered a women unless she's not any of those.

You'll be wrong. Pointing out shit that is harmful to women or sexist isn't necessarily saying that people should be ashamed about being guys. Yes, we do this. Usually without ever thinking about it. It is our responsibility to use our social power to NOT do it, and pointing it out helps do that.

And gee, it's almost like there's a video series there to be done about how sexism and the patriarchy is harmful to men and male characters, too. Maybe you should start a Kickstarter for that :)

Because she is under no obligations to be all WHAT ABOUT THE MEN?? when she's doing something specifically about female characters. Why don't you start one?

LastGreatBlasphemer:
The documentary is proven to be needed by the vitriolic hatred she received, but WE know it's not needed.

So.

The fact that we gamers - and yes, hardcore gamers - started throwing misogynistic slurs and threats around, tried to get her shut down with unethical and not-really-legal means, shows that the gaming culture has a problem with sexism, ergo, this documentary is needed.

But we know it's not needed.

But.

You just.

I don't.

What.

It's great that she's raising awareness towards the issue, and misogynistic pricks on youtube are misogynistic and pricks, but I'm not quite sure why she needed the Kickstarter when she's already achieved a metric ton of cultural influence without it.

But hey, alright. Moar is better. Nothing motivates like getting paid, right? :P

That said, it'll be interesting to see the boundaries between exactly what characters she defines as "sexist" or "misogynistic" - as one of my favorite Escapist podcasts discussed, "sexy" in contrast to "sexual". The heavy-handedness and over-simplification of her language in the pitch doesn't inspire a lot of confidence in me (not enough to get my dollars, anyway), but at least she has the ambition to do her research and extrapolate accordingly.

I just hope her final product considers context of her examples reasonably. And maybe give a shout-out to the writers and character designers who are doing these things right. God knows at the very least that 50k could go towards an incentive for developers to improve on that aspect.

Richardplex:

Wow. He starts with a strawman and works his way down. Amazing.

I haven't looked too much into this but does the Escapist pay people to put up "news"? I don't agree to those youtube comments but I'm kind of baffled that something like this made it to the news section. Please keep to actual news instead of repeatedly posting "internet people are dicks" as news. Or better is there anyway to block all threads started by OP?

Buretsu:

There's a chance I'm wrong, but I fully expect the entire point will be to educate about how horrible men are and how badly we stereotype women, and how ashamed we should feel about ourselves as a result.

Never mind that a man isn't considered a man unless he shoots first and asks questions later, screws the rules, and has the emotional range of an enraged howler monkey, what really matters is that a woman isn't considered a women unless she's not any of those.

Maybe you should try watching some Feminist Frequency videos sometime so you don't have to guess. Gender stereotypes that are harmful to men are definitely discussed when relevant.

Is it just me or did a lot of the comments seem to come from /b/ros? Sounds just like everyday conversation on /b/. The name BoxxyIzQueen is a pretty big giveaway too.

This seems like it could just as likely be /b/ comment bombing it for lulz rather than an honest reaction.

Thrashgrinder:

Grey Carter:
"so you're a bolshevik feminist jewess that hates White people and does website design for Tim Wise extremist platform and you expect to be taken seriously when you're "critique-ing" video games," writes charming YouTube user, Haploguy.

"fucking ovendodger," he adds.

Wow. Nice job targeting individual people on the internet. I think you should also give the persons home adress too. That's the kind of journalism this site was lacking.

they deserve it, the fucking scum should be thrown into the street like the trash they are.

Thrashgrinder:

ARCTIC_EAGLE:

Thrashgrinder:

Wow. Nice job targeting individual people on the internet. I think you should also give the persons home adress too. That's the kind of journalism this site was lacking.

they deserve it, the fucking scum should be thrown into the street like the trash they are.

Yeah. If you say so.

I do, as should those who support segregation, bans on equal rights (based on race, sexual orientation, religion, etc), the KKK, Al Qaeda

Thrashgrinder:

ARCTIC_EAGLE:

Thrashgrinder:

Yeah. If you say so.

I do, as should those who support segregation, bans on equal rights (based on race, sexual orientation, religion, etc), the KKK, Al Qaeda

Well, You and I have very different opinions on this matter. There is no reason for argument.

agreed, I just wanted to be sure you understood the kinda of people I group with the commenter's. So how do you evaluate these people? Morons on the internet, jerks, trolls, or people who have an opinion yet haven't articulated it well?

Buretsu:

Eternal_Lament:
At this point in time it would seem more reasonable (and more productive) to use Kickstarter to fund games with better female characters rather than to make a documentary about the lack of good female characters in video games. It's sort of like a hospital getting funding to help improve hospital standards, and rather than improving the hospital the money is instead used to make a documentary on how the hospital is in disarray. I guess my thought is that with the countless number of youtube videos, blogs, even forum posts dedicated to the subject, it would seem to me that we have gone past the "Identify the problem" stage and should be heading into the "How do we resolve this" stage.

I disagree, because it seems we haven't identified the problem. The problem is sexism, not mysogyny. The problem isn't how women are treated badly in games, it's how all genders are forced to adhere to respective sets of stereotypes. Focusing on the misogyny while ignoring the misandry isn't helping, it's showing unfair bias.

The point really can apply to any group or issue. My point was that if this person was really upset about the portrayal of women in games, a better solution would be to use the kickstarter to fund a game with a positive portrayal of women rather than making a documentary about how there are few games with positive portrayals. The first one is productive, the second one does nothing to help. As people said, it's not just because many vids or vlogs have been done on the subject or that it may be a very opinionated documentary, but because it just prolongs the issue. To use another analogy, it's like a burning building. Sure announcing the fire brings attention to it, but sooner or later someone has to put it out or call 911. We don't need more people making vids about the issue, we need people to take a proactive stance and actually make products to help rectify the issue.

I would like to point out that the amount of money she's gotten would suggest that there are in fact a lot of gamers who are more than okay with this, and just don't comment on Youtube.

More to the point, why does she need thousands of dollars for this? She talks about the "scope and scale" of the research and production work involved, but, based on what I can see of her work, there are people out there who produce content of similar quality for no money at all (besides what they get from website ads).

For this price, the finished product had better be pretty damn impressive. It should also feature audio quality significantly better than what I can hear in that video (seriously, what is with all that white noise in the background?).

Eternal_Lament:

We don't need more people making vids about the issue, we need people to take a proactive stance and actually make products to help rectify the issue.

We need both. Constructive discussion is good, better portrayals are good. There's no mutual exclusivity, here.

DVS BSTrD:
WOW people on the internet being sexist, racist assholes.

.

basically this..

It's like a very rich jewish man walking by a nazi house while being blinged out, of course they were saying shit before on there front porch, but now they are going to be vehemently raging about it. You could argue that she did it in that way so she would get those responses that would fuel her video/kickstarter even more, everyone knows youtube is the worst place for that kind of shit.

Not to say that there shouldn't be better women characters in video games, especially based on alot of the stereotypes that are cliched today in games, but I don't think she is going about it in the right way nor should she need/recieve 6000+ dollars for it, people have done more for less on youtube just as a hobby/passion.

The Rogue Wolf:

I wonder how many of these mental reprobates have gone on-record as saying they want more maturity in games? (Of course, to this crowd, "maturity" means T&A.) And how many have complained that the stereotype of "gamer" is "mentally-adolescent shut-in"? (Which, of course, they then go and prove here.)

Sharp shootin', pardners, y'got yerselves right in the collective foot.

I wouldn't be surprised if it was a LOT of them. Gamers, for all their demand of gaming being taken seriously, seem to be content to let the medium stagnate in the same white, heterosexual male power fantasy it has been for awhile now. Women are surprisingly underrepresented in gaming and are also subject to being shown in a sexist manner (unintentional or otherwise).

Considering the company she works for, she probably could do this for half of her goal and still make a substantial profit in the education sector. The way the media could portray this, the amount of money she's making makes it seem like she's padding her wallet.

Granted, if this does end up becoming part of a classroom curriculum, I could understand her needing to receive some funding or sponsorship. $6k seems enough for the scope of her research, but $43k is just astronomically high. I wouldn't want to censor her or debase her because of her viewpoint alone. I do think she should put a cap on her Kickstarter now that she's already 7 times past her initial goal.