Aside from there being about forty Lego video games in the past decade? She was arguing that, much like the video game culture, the Lego environment is a boys' club and reinforces gender stereotypes and plays to subtle sexism. She gave examples such as the fact that almost the entirety of authority type roles and those of heroes in the Lego universe (police officers and firemen, for example) are male, while things such as chefs are women.
She's constantly making comments and speaking to the community. She's simply asking here how her backers would most like the videos displayed and the information delivered.
I didn't know when I begun this conversation that I'd need to explain the entire topic. I assumed someone commenting would at least know a little about what's going on.
i have seen that awful video she made about Lego, her argument was essentially "these legos are males, they must be sexist", even though Lego figures doesn't have any gender.
and just because there is lego games doesnt make lego part of gaming, its like saying that cars are part of gaming because there happens to be cars in games.
and i really dont see how gaming is a boys club, theres plenty of females playing games, its more of a unisex club.
Hmm... Google must be broken typing "female lego minifigures" and "male lego minifigures" and selecting (images) brings up different sets of pictures.
The problem with Anita's argument is that it relies on the idea that all negative portrayals of women are sexist, and it seems what she wants is not a balanced portrayal of women but a purely positive one and that is frankly ridiculous. I mean can I argue a game is sexist because a male character is portrayed as stupid, evil or weak? No of course I can't because these sorts of people exist in real life and by portraying them the game would have more believable characters. So why if a game portrays women as stupid,evil or weak is it sexist?
Boudica: She gave examples such as the fact that almost the entirety of authority type roles and those of heroes in the Lego universe (police officers and firemen, for example) are male, while things such as chefs are women.
To be fair most chefs in the real world are men, so I guess that's something?
felbot: i have seen that awful video she made about Lego, her argument was essentially "these legos are males, they must be sexist", even though Lego figures doesn't have any gender.
Could you have missed the point any harder?
She gave examples such as the fact that almost the entirety of authority type roles and those of heroes in the Lego universe (police officers and firemen, for example) are male, while things such as chefs are women.
No gender in Lego?
Willful ignorance because you dislike someone is no less unacceptable.
ok so there is gender in lego, but they dont seem that in equal, they both have surfers skate boarders and vikings, the only difference seems to be the numbers.
and i have to wonder how having males in power could be so sad.
JeffBergGold: Unattractive woman who has duped desperate white knights and other unattractive women into giving her money.
If you had to respect this woman you'd have to respect her as a con artist. Although I gotta admit that her angle and her con is pretty ingenious. If she would've gotten a MBA instead of a liberal arts degree she could've been a billionaire by now.
It's not that great, tbh it might have barely hit it's original mark on it's own. She just got extremely lucky with all that negative attention that brought in the additional money with it.
On it's own, it's just a small twist on a fake charity type scam. Not anything super complicated or intelligent.
Can we stop giving this attention? I know this is a gaming forum where we talk about game related stuff but if you don't like what she is doing stop posting in these threads and stop making these threads and she'll fall right back into obscurity where she belongs.
felbot: i have seen that awful video she made about Lego, her argument was essentially "these legos are males, they must be sexist", even though Lego figures doesn't have any gender.
Could you have missed the point any harder?
She gave examples such as the fact that almost the entirety of authority type roles and those of heroes in the Lego universe (police officers and firemen, for example) are male, while things such as chefs are women.
No gender in Lego?
Willful ignorance because you dislike someone is no less unacceptable.
ok so there is gender in lego, but they dont seem that in equal, they both have surfers skate boarders and vikings, the only difference seems to be the numbers.
and i have to wonder how having males in power could be so sad.
Are you for real? Like, no joke or anything? I can't tell. You keep saying things and then taking it back and saying something else. Is... is this Punk'd?
trollpwner: What outrages me even more is the fact that she just takes some of this crap totally out of context. Thief 2? A game with incredibly strong female characters? Set in a society where you see women doing the same jobs as men and reaching positions of wealth and power denied in a patriarchal society? Sexist? Because of one escort mission? Fuck off.
It seems they don't even want to try and make this a valid study. This is just pissing me off.
Last I checked, she isn't saying the entire game is sexist, but that it has parts that are.
That doesn't make any sense though.
A game with strong female leads having a single female character that is weak is not sexist. Or is it sexist to imply that any female anywhere, ever can be weak?
Because this is the kind of route we seem to be going down.
Olikar: The problem with Anita's argument is that it relies on the idea that all negative portrayals of women are sexist, and it seems what she wants is not a balanced portrayal of women but a purely positive one and that is frankly ridiculous. I mean can I argue a game is sexist because a male character is portrayed as stupid, evil or weak? No of course I can't because these sorts of people exist in real life and by portraying them the game would have more believable characters. So why if a game portrays women as stupid,evil or weak is it sexist?
Welcome to the forums, and you have hit the point I was trying to make square on the head.
Creating a weak female character is not sexist.
Making all of your female characters weak while making all of your male characters strong, could be considered sexist, depending on the context of the word 'weak'.
Making all of your female characters weak and pointing out that they are weak because they are female is obviously sexist.
trollpwner: What outrages me even more is the fact that she just takes some of this crap totally out of context. Thief 2? A game with incredibly strong female characters? Set in a society where you see women doing the same jobs as men and reaching positions of wealth and power denied in a patriarchal society? Sexist? Because of one escort mission? Fuck off.
It seems they don't even want to try and make this a valid study. This is just pissing me off.
Last I checked, she isn't saying the entire game is sexist, but that it has parts that are.
That doesn't make any sense though.
A game with strong female leads having a single female character that is weak is not sexist. Or is it sexist to imply that any female anywhere, ever can be weak?
Because this is the kind of route we seem to be going down.
"Of the 100 parts, 1 is sexist."
What it means: a small portion of the larger whole is sexist. What you think it means: the whole 100 is sexist? BULLSHIT!
Boudica: Could you have missed the point any harder?
No gender in Lego?
Willful ignorance because you dislike someone is no less unacceptable.
ok so there is gender in lego, but they dont seem that in equal, they both have surfers skate boarders and vikings, the only difference seems to be the numbers.
and i have to wonder how having males in power could be so sad.
Are you for real? Like, no joke or anything? I can't tell. You keep saying things and then taking it back and saying something else. Is... is this Punk'd?
well this discussion pretty much became a joke when we started talking about legos instead of anita being a lazy scammer.
I think she's a bloody genius. Managing to squeeze 150 GRAND out of people just by playing video games for a year. Damn, wish people were that generous to me. I'd even do those videos about tropes and shit.
Eh, I find her...research to be pretty bare bones and the fact she couldn't meet her own deadlines is quite disheartening. I have nothing against her as a woman...why the fuck would I...but as a journalist I just don't get it.
This is hilarious, not only does she not know what to do with the money (300 games for a series starting in august? Really?) she's taken a bunch of tropes off of TvTropes and is now claiming that she needs help researching.
I'm really tempted to just link her all the relevant TvTropes pages and point her to the video gaming section. People have been ripped off and everyone saw it coming, surprise surprise.
ok so there is gender in lego, but they dont seem that in equal, they both have surfers skate boarders and vikings, the only difference seems to be the numbers.
and i have to wonder how having males in power could be so sad.
Are you for real? Like, no joke or anything? I can't tell. You keep saying things and then taking it back and saying something else. Is... is this Punk'd?
well this discussion pretty much became a joke when we started talking about legos instead of anita being a lazy scammer.
Actually, I mentioned Lego as being one of the issues she's commented on lately. Then you decided to make the statement that there is no gender in Lego. I proved you wrong and then you went on to ramble something about men in power being sad. I don't know.
Moral of the story: don't make things up and throw conjecture around like it's fact, else... Well, else someone might give you a picture of some Lego that doesn't exist.
Gatx: Is that really how Kickstarter works? I mean I finally thought I grasped it on a very, very basic level as using preorders to fund development. That way even if you raise a lot of money you're still basically going to make the same game you were planning to make. I guess it's different with her though since she's asking for research funding (I guess would be the best way to describe it?) In that case she should be using some of that money earned to hire assistants to help her with something like this instead of asking the people who paid her.
Kickstarters, unlike preorders, are extremely risky. There is never a guarantee that the funded project will see the light of day but with preorders this is a given. There is the risk that funding is vastly underestimated, that the team breaks apart due to bad managing or that people overestimate their capabilities. And of course there can be scam.
Before funding anything there you should be sure that 1: you could accept a possible failure and 2: you know the person you are funding has the capabilities of doing what they promise. Examples for that are the Double Fine adventure which is not out for commercial success, has capable names behind it and the funders will see at least a doku about the failure and Project Giana, a game nearly done where the developers fund it with their money (by taking other jobs in the field) and which is for a big part already done, the kickstarter is just there to help filling the final gap.
I won't go into this specific Kickstarter. The thing is: All the people yelling "I called it" need to understand that if back then all of you would not have made all that fuzz about this woman attacking your toys the only people who would've paid would have been the same peeps who already donated money for her previous projects. What happened here is most likely what Tenmar called: She has no idea how to put all that money proper to work and underestimated the amount of work it'll take to even go for the most broad depiction of the tropes.
What it means: a small portion of the larger whole is sexist. What you think it means: the whole 100 is sexist? BULLSHIT!
Not in the fucking slightest.
If they create strong female characters, and they also create weak female characters, then they clearly are of the attitude that some women are strong and some women are weak.
Just like reality, oddly enough. Not everybody is born smart, independent, beautiful, resourceful and strong.
Having a weak female character is not inherently sexist. Having a female character who needs to be defended is not inherently sexist. Having a female character who is sexual is not inherently sexist.
Implying that the three above examples are accurate of the average woman would be sexist. Implying that the above are not true of men, but are true of women would be sexist.
By that logic:
Having any black character like rap music is racist. Having any black character be poor is racist. Having any black character being a criminal is racist. Having any gay character be camp is homophobic. Having any gay character melodramatic is homophobic.
Do people who fit the above exist?
Of course they do.
Would creating a character with any of these traits be racist or homophobic?
Only if they imply that this is the norm, and that anybody who doesn't fit in with that is 'wrong' somehow. Or if they suggest that all black/gay people like that.
Are you for real? Like, no joke or anything? I can't tell. You keep saying things and then taking it back and saying something else. Is... is this Punk'd?
well this discussion pretty much became a joke when we started talking about legos instead of anita being a lazy scammer.
Actually, I mentioned Lego as being one of the issues she's commented on lately. Then you decided to make the statement that there is no gender in Lego. I proved you wrong and then you went on to ramble something about men in power being sad. I don't know.
Moral of the story: don't make things up and throw conjecture around like it's fact, else... Well, else someone might give you a picture of some Lego that doesn't exist.
fine i made one mistake about legos, they still aren't part of gaming as you claimed and anita is still taking advantage of people that give her money.
What it means: a small portion of the larger whole is sexist. What you think it means: the whole 100 is sexist? BULLSHIT!
Not in the fucking slightest.
If they create strong female characters, and they also create weak female characters, then they clearly are of the attitude that some women are strong and some women are weak.
Just like reality, oddly enough. Not everybody is born smart, independent, beautiful, resourceful and strong.
Having a weak female character is not inherently sexist. Having a female character who needs to be defended is not inherently sexist. Having a female character who is sexual is not inherently sexist.
Implying that the three above examples are accurate of the average woman would be sexist. Implying that the above are not true of men, but are true of women would be sexist.
By that logic:
Having any black character like rap music is racist. Having any black character be poor is racist. Having any black character being a criminal is racist. Having any gay character be camp is homophobic. Having any gay character melodramatic is homophobic.
The list could go on forever.
With an exact quote, show me exactly where I said I agree with her comment regarding the game. Maybe I was pointing out what she said and what it means, hm?
well this discussion pretty much became a joke when we started talking about legos instead of anita being a lazy scammer.
Actually, I mentioned Lego as being one of the issues she's commented on lately. Then you decided to make the statement that there is no gender in Lego. I proved you wrong and then you went on to ramble something about men in power being sad. I don't know.
Moral of the story: don't make things up and throw conjecture around like it's fact, else... Well, else someone might give you a picture of some Lego that doesn't exist.
fine i made one mistake about legos, they still aren't part of gaming as you claimed and anita is still taking advantage of people that give her money.
What it means: a small portion of the larger whole is sexist. What you think it means: the whole 100 is sexist? BULLSHIT!
Not in the fucking slightest.
If they create strong female characters, and they also create weak female characters, then they clearly are of the attitude that some women are strong and some women are weak.
Just like reality, oddly enough. Not everybody is born smart, independent, beautiful, resourceful and strong.
Having a weak female character is not inherently sexist. Having a female character who needs to be defended is not inherently sexist. Having a female character who is sexual is not inherently sexist.
Implying that the three above examples are accurate of the average woman would be sexist. Implying that the above are not true of men, but are true of women would be sexist.
By that logic:
Having any black character like rap music is racist. Having any black character be poor is racist. Having any black character being a criminal is racist. Having any gay character be camp is homophobic. Having any gay character melodramatic is homophobic.
The list could go on forever.
Fucking this. I was about to write a long post about how you've gotten the term sexist wrong because anyone who really thinks that a single weak character is sexist doesn't understand what sexism is.
Gatx: Is that really how Kickstarter works? I mean I finally thought I grasped it on a very, very basic level as using preorders to fund development. That way even if you raise a lot of money you're still basically going to make the same game you were planning to make. I guess it's different with her though since she's asking for research funding (I guess would be the best way to describe it?) In that case she should be using some of that money earned to hire assistants to help her with something like this instead of asking the people who paid her.
I won't go into this specific Kickstarter. The thing is: All the people yelling "I called it" need to understand that if back then all of you would not have made all that fuzz about this woman attacking your toys the only people who would've paid would have been the same peeps who already donated money for her previous projects.
You appear to believe that everyone who "called it" made a fuss about it, rather than looking at it, smirking and moving on.
What it means: a small portion of the larger whole is sexist. What you think it means: the whole 100 is sexist? BULLSHIT!
Not in the fucking slightest.
If they create strong female characters, and they also create weak female characters, then they clearly are of the attitude that some women are strong and some women are weak.
Just like reality, oddly enough. Not everybody is born smart, independent, beautiful, resourceful and strong.
Having a weak female character is not inherently sexist. Having a female character who needs to be defended is not inherently sexist. Having a female character who is sexual is not inherently sexist.
Implying that the three above examples are accurate of the average woman would be sexist. Implying that the above are not true of men, but are true of women would be sexist.
By that logic:
Having any black character like rap music is racist. Having any black character be poor is racist. Having any black character being a criminal is racist. Having any gay character be camp is homophobic. Having any gay character melodramatic is homophobic.
The list could go on forever.
With an exact quote, show me exactly where I said I agree with her comment regarding the game. Maybe I was pointing out what she said and what it means, hm?
I never said you did agree with it, I said the logic in your response was nonsensical.
If you create 99 strong female characters and have 1 weak one, that weak one is not sexist.
To say it is, is to say that no female character should ever be allowed to be shown to have any negative traits, which is just ridiculous.
If you were not showing support for that logic, then perhaps you ought to put more content into your posts to make your view points clear. You cannot blame somebody of being ignorant of your perspective when you don't make that perspective clear.
Boudica: [quote="Legion" post="9.387184.15460017"]With an exact quote, show me exactly where I said I agree with her comment regarding the game. Maybe I was pointing out what she said and what it means, hm?
I don't think it was even Sarkeesian who said it anyway, it was a suggestion from a backer.
If they create strong female characters, and they also create weak female characters, then they clearly are of the attitude that some women are strong and some women are weak.
Just like reality, oddly enough. Not everybody is born smart, independent, beautiful, resourceful and strong.
Having a weak female character is not inherently sexist. Having a female character who needs to be defended is not inherently sexist. Having a female character who is sexual is not inherently sexist.
Implying that the three above examples are accurate of the average woman would be sexist. Implying that the above are not true of men, but are true of women would be sexist.
By that logic:
Having any black character like rap music is racist. Having any black character be poor is racist. Having any black character being a criminal is racist. Having any gay character be camp is homophobic. Having any gay character melodramatic is homophobic.
The list could go on forever.
With an exact quote, show me exactly where I said I agree with her comment regarding the game. Maybe I was pointing out what she said and what it means, hm?
I never said you did agree with it, I said the logic in your response was nonsensical.
If you create 99 strong female characters and have 1 weak one, that weak one is not sexist.
To say it is, is to say that no female character should ever be allowed to be shown to have any negative traits, which is just ridiculous.
If you were not showing support for that logic, then perhaps you ought to put more content into your posts to make your view points clear. You cannot blame somebody of being ignorant of your perspective when you don't make that perspective clear.
>Implies there's no difference between a weak character and centuries of depiction.
No one cares about one weak character. No one. Not the most extreme feminist or the most apathetic passerby. No one cares. The problem is when almost every single woman in video games is secondary, weaker than everyone else, helpless and/or there to help the men.
One damsel in distress isn't sexism. Showing nothing but weak women, however, is.
>Implies there's no difference between a weak character and centuries of depiction.
No one cares about one weak character. No one. Not the most extreme feminist or the most apathetic passerby. No one cares. The problem is when almost every single woman in video games is secondary, weaker than everyone else, helpless and/or there to help the men.
One damsel in distress isn't sexism. Showing nothing but weak women, however, is.
And since games don't just depict women as weak there is no sexism in games?
Boudica: With an exact quote, show me exactly where I said I agree with her comment regarding the game. Maybe I was pointing out what she said and what it means, hm?
I never said you did agree with it, I said the logic in your response was nonsensical.
If you create 99 strong female characters and have 1 weak one, that weak one is not sexist.
To say it is, is to say that no female character should ever be allowed to be shown to have any negative traits, which is just ridiculous.
If you were not showing support for that logic, then perhaps you ought to put more content into your posts to make your view points clear. You cannot blame somebody of being ignorant of your perspective when you don't make that perspective clear.
>Implies there's no difference between a weak character and centuries of depiction.
No one cares about one weak character. No one. Not the most extreme feminist or the most apathetic passerby. No one cares. The problem is when almost every single woman in video games is secondary, weaker than everyone else, helpless and/or there to help the men.
One damsel in distress isn't sexism. Showing nothing but weak women, however, is.
Do you even play video games? Because there are plenty of strong female characters. You may not want to see them but they do exist.
I can't wait to hear her opinion on Nier, that's going to be hilarious for a variety of reasons. I know she has it, it was in the picture of games she posted.
You appear to believe that everyone who "called it" made a fuss about it, rather than looking at it, smirking and moving on.
Well, of course there were a few who smirked about it. And then there were the ton who participated in long threads of throwing shit at her and pulling the situation there was into the attention of everyone. ;)
Just assume that with this I meant more of a figure of speech rather than accurate labeling.
I never said you did agree with it, I said the logic in your response was nonsensical.
If you create 99 strong female characters and have 1 weak one, that weak one is not sexist.
To say it is, is to say that no female character should ever be allowed to be shown to have any negative traits, which is just ridiculous.
If you were not showing support for that logic, then perhaps you ought to put more content into your posts to make your view points clear. You cannot blame somebody of being ignorant of your perspective when you don't make that perspective clear.
>Implies there's no difference between a weak character and centuries of depiction.
No one cares about one weak character. No one. Not the most extreme feminist or the most apathetic passerby. No one cares. The problem is when almost every single woman in video games is secondary, weaker than everyone else, helpless and/or there to help the men.
One damsel in distress isn't sexism. Showing nothing but weak women, however, is.
Do you even play video games? Because there are plenty of strong female characters. You may not want to see them but they do exist.
Plenty? No. Some? Yup. Your point? Or did you not read and are simply commenting on the knee-jerk?
The problem is when almost every single woman in video games is secondary.
>Implies there's no difference between a weak character and centuries of depiction.
No one cares about one weak character. No one. Not the most extreme feminist or the most apathetic passerby. No one cares. The problem is when almost every single woman in video games is secondary, weaker than everyone else, helpless and/or there to help the men.
One damsel in distress isn't sexism. Showing nothing but weak women, however, is.
Nothing but weak women? Some of the most awesome strong characters in fiction are women. I am not sure what fiction you like, but you must have very unfortunate judgement when it comes to picking games.
Having women as secondary characters is not necessarily sexist either. If the game is aimed at a male audience, then the main character is normally going to be a male. That's not sexist, it's called aiming a product at the target demographic.
You know, like how you don't see eyeliner adverts for men.
The problem is when almost every single woman in video games is secondary.
Except that is simply untrue. To say otherwise is either stupidity, or wilfully ignoring the facts.
There are tons of strong female characters. There are less main characters, but the last two parts of my above response are my thoughts on that.
Now it is starting to be made more aware that girls the same kind of games as guys, thankfully we will start seeing more variety in them, but it's not down to sexism, it's down to marketing.
>Implies there's no difference between a weak character and centuries of depiction.
No one cares about one weak character. No one. Not the most extreme feminist or the most apathetic passerby. No one cares. The problem is when almost every single woman in video games is secondary, weaker than everyone else, helpless and/or there to help the men.
One damsel in distress isn't sexism. Showing nothing but weak women, however, is.
Do you even play video games? Because there are plenty of strong female characters. You may not want to see them but they do exist.
Plenty? No. Some? Yup. Your point? Or did you not read and are simply commenting on the knee-jerk?
The problem is when almost every single woman in video games is secondary.
I know what you said. And you are wrong. To me you are just another feminist refusing to see the facts as they exist in reality. Strong female characters exist in droves. Do they all get to be protagonists? No. Deal with it.
so.... what she is doing is basically the very same thing TV Tropes did already? and she cant even do that? dammit, send more money to her! WE NEED THAT FUNDED! xD but yeah, those IDIOTS who keep coming with arguments like "she is unattractive" really do piss me off. because of idiots like you, my friendly friend, she was able to con people out of their money. if anything, you should go and ask for your share of profit.
my opinion? those tropes are buried deeply into our society. someone should indeed, uncover them and find reasoning for them. but to do so, we should find someone who is competent, has a large group of experienced researchers, and not someone who just got funding from kickstarter and now has a mountain of games to look through (no doubt in many cases simply glancing them, because you cant RESEARCH a 100 games in a lifetime, less the amount she has to go through). she could research maybe 5-10 games, because lets be honest, if you want to analyse something, you REALLY need to spend a lot of time.
so yeah, to me, the very premise seems doomed to fail from the very start. and now the blocks will start falling, disappoint a group of people, and put other people from doing the research properly the next time.
Hmm... Google must be broken typing "female lego minifigures" and "male lego minifigures" and selecting (images) brings up different sets of pictures.
female:
https://www.google.com/search?q=female+lego+minifigures&hl=en&prmd=imvns&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=09NFUL_uAZTO8wTj8oCwDg&ved=0CAgQ_AUoAQ&biw=1270&bih=655
male:
https://www.google.com/search?q=male+lego+minifigures&hl=en&prmd=imvns&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=YNVFUOuXM4Ok8QSwzYDYAQ&ved=0CAgQ_AUoAQ&biw=1270&bih=655
Oh, as a bonus I found this because of the above google images.
http://tawcabout.wordpress.com/2012/07/22/lego-an-everyday-story-of-mini-folk/