Sexism in gaming: how much arse is too much arse?

I think there are several different arguments on this one.

It would be foolish to argue that there is no sexism in gaming, obviously there is a lot of it. Whether that’s the games themselves or their audiences (online gamers ), games have a huge amount of sexism.

But that doesn’t go for every game and it is too complex an issue to say that games are sexist, there are plenty of exceptions. I think it would be fairer to say that gaming mostly suffers from stereotypes. The scantily dressed girl character, the enormous bald space marine character, the black demolitions expert character…. I don’t think it is a conscious effort to be sexist/racist, more that designers can be lazy and rather than mix things up they just think somebody shooting guns will be an 18 stone muscly bald bloke.

Things are changing though, as the design teams get more diverse, so will the games.

But Tetris is always disgusting. The way those shapes just slot into any gaps that they happen to find without caring about the gaps they should be plugging.

Tafdolphin wrote:

Death's Head wrote:

Tafdolphin wrote:

Death's Head wrote:Yes, but this is just how things are unfortunately. Sex is added to everything. Look at movies from the 50s compared to today, no actress was expected to get their kit off. Look at music, imagine a song in the 50s or 60s mentioning sex or an LP with the word "strawberry float" on. Why should we expect any other form of entertainment to not pander to the same market?

Sex sells.

Common misconception: sexism isn't just about sex. It's about gender. Sure, "sex sells" and that's a mantra that's every bit as true today as it was in the 50s, but this doesn't cover aspects of sexism such as the under-representation of women in games. Check the graphs in the mic article: female protags are few and far between, although as Skippy says that is improving. Remember The Last Night, set in a world where "feminism won" and where equality and plenty is seen as a negative.

I can't think of many games where time is spent sexing up the male characters. Sex sells, but not the male sex variety.

Yeah but "sex sells" has never, ever applied to men when talking about advertising in general. Also, it looks like you're responding to something I wasn't trying to say. I was trying to say that your reply was all about sexualisation. Sexism is about more than that.

Wasn't sex the entire premise behind the Diet Coke adverts with the buff window cleaners? Men are very much sexualised in advertising. Perhaps not to the same extent as women, but they most definitely are.

From a gaming perspective you could argue that there are plenty of games that showcase what is considered an "Ideal", or sexualised male. It's just that they mostly keep their clothes on.
Even beyond sexualising characters, games and media in general are chock full of what I would consider negative reinforcement of what a guy "should" look like. God knows I had mild body image issues because I just didn't measure up to what I thought I "should" look like. I was tall, skinny and awkward. I hated taking my top off in front of other people.

Sorry, but I've rambled off topic a bit there.

Yes some games are sexist. Some are not. There's definite improvement, but as with most things it'll take time. But I think we need to also acknowledge that their portrayals of Men are hardly realistic either.

Interesting points well made, I completely forgot about the Diet Coke man. And yes, the majority of men in games are good looking to an extent, or at the very least fit and sporty, although I would argue that this isn't in order to sell the games so much as it is to comply with gender norms.

Not lately, no.

Buffalo wrote:Not lately, no.

http://store.steampowered.com/agecheck/app/611790/

NSFW


https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2017/0 ... use-party/

House Party is, if nothing else, a fascinating exploration of a certain type of male mind. It’s the type of male mind that sees women as goals to be conquered, rather than autonomous individuals, and believes that manipulated suitably, all women will want to see inside your underpants. Or, as is the case in House Party, you can show them inside your pants whether they like it or not.

Who buys shite like that House Party game? I'm kind of worried that its reviews are 'Positive' on Steam.

The problem with videogames, and tech companies in general, is that we have spent decades telling women to avoid work in IT and computing because "banana splits and counting don't mix". Up until Maryam Mirzakhani won the Fields prize it was just assumed that no woman ever would. It isn't that long since I made my college choices and even then the idea that having a vagina impaired your ability to do sums was being pushed. Our career guidance counselor at the time was always parroting the message that biochemistry was for smart girls while computer engineering was for smart boys. She wasn't going on a solo run with that advice, it was the accepted viewpoint and was universally pushed. My college class had a ratio of 12 men to each woman and that was an improvement on previous years. It's why hand wringing over diversity reports for companies like Dell or Microsoft is a near pointless exercise. They've been drawing from pools of almost exclusively male talent for decades and that sort of workforce will take decades to rebalance.

When an industry is male dominated to that sort of extent then unfortunately I believe that sexist behaviour is very hard to keep under control even though most of it will be down to foolishness and not overtly malicious behaviour.


Things are improving but I'd still have to answer yes to question in the topic title.



Sorry if my posts a bit all over the place but I find it hard to express my feelings on this topic coherently at the best of times, nevermind when I posting from a phone.

Tafdolphin wrote:Interesting points well made, I completely forgot about the Diet Coke man. And yes, the majority of men in games are good looking to an extent, or at the very least fit and sporty, although I would argue that this isn't in order to sell the games so much as it is to comply with gender norms.

It's happening across the entertainment spectrum - I wouldn't say that having idealised male characters is tantamount to sexism any more than I would say that about female characters(although there is unquestionably an argument there) simply because the vast, vast majority of characters are created to conform to ideals across both(all) genders.

It's how they're used that is important and I think it's pretty strawberry floating clear that there's still a big issue with sexism and attitudes towards women not just in videogames but in the wider gaming community as well.

Ultimately as long as the current model makes money nothing will change, and that's a damning indictment of the culture IMO

That House Party game was in my queue thing on steam the other day. I have no idea why, it's not like I have any games like it. I did watch the trailer for it and it did seem like the people, both male and female were having a lot of fun with it. Still, a shitty excuse of a game though.

Karl wrote:Who buys shite like that House Party game? I'm kind of worried that its reviews are 'Positive' on Steam.

It has a very positive rating.

Is House Party a sexist game, though? Or is it a game for sexists?

Tafdolphin wrote:Interesting points well made, I completely forgot about the Diet Coke man. And yes, the majority of men in games are good looking to an extent, or at the very least fit and sporty, although I would argue that this isn't in order to sell the games so much as it is to comply with gender norms.

When a game has attractive guys it in - that's complying with gender norms.
When a game has attractive girls in it - that's sexism.

Eh?

Preezy wrote:

Tafdolphin wrote:Interesting points well made, I completely forgot about the Diet Coke man. And yes, the majority of men in games are good looking to an extent, or at the very least fit and sporty, although I would argue that this isn't in order to sell the games so much as it is to comply with gender norms.

When a game has attractive guys it in - that's complying with gender norms.
When a game has attractive girls in it - that's sexism.

Eh?

When a game has an attractive guy in it, how often is there a scene that lingers on his bare chest, or arse, or crotch? When there's an attractive woman in a game, this happens almost always (Mass Effect 2 is a perfect example of this).

Attractive men are placed in games for the same reason most male movie stars are attractive: they are aspirational for the viewer. They are not there as eye candy, but as they titular "Men want to be him" hero. When an attractive woman is placed in a game, more often that not it is for titillation, or comes with a side order of objectification.

My only recent reference point is FIFA, so I'll go with yes. Because the women in it are strawberry floating gooseberry fool.

Tafdolphin wrote:

Preezy wrote:

Tafdolphin wrote:Interesting points well made, I completely forgot about the Diet Coke man. And yes, the majority of men in games are good looking to an extent, or at the very least fit and sporty, although I would argue that this isn't in order to sell the games so much as it is to comply with gender norms.

When a game has attractive guys it in - that's complying with gender norms.
When a game has attractive girls in it - that's sexism.

Eh?

When a game has an attractive guy in it, how often is there a scene that lingers on his bare chest, or arse, or crotch? When there's an attractive woman in a game, this happens almost always (Mass Effect 2 is a perfect example of this).

Attractive men are placed in games for the same reason most male movie stars are attractive: they are aspirational for the viewer. They are not there as eye candy, but as they titular "Men want to be him" hero. When an attractive woman is placed in a game, more often that not it is for titillation, or comes with a side order of objectification.

Not disagreeing with the chest lingering side of your argument (although I'm not sure this is quite as prevalent as you imply - but maybe I'm just not playing those sorts of games so much) - however attractive movie and TV stars absolutely are used as eye candy. There are women who will go to watch a film because it has the attractive man they want to look at in it, or because they've heard about that scene where X is topless etc. Take something fairly recent like Guardians of The Galaxy there's a scene where they are being put into the prison and (for whatever reason) this involves the inmates being stripped down and hosed with some orange liquid - we see Chris Pratt going through this with various shots designed to showcase his physique. Does this serve the storytelling - to a degree I guess but it's also partly there because they know a portion of the audience simply wants to see a semi clad attractive man. It's also notable that the female character who presumably also goes through this process does not get shown in her underwear during this sequence.

As stated previously sexism is also about much more than sex. Going back to the topic of advertising, yes there are far more examples of women being used as eye candy in advertising and that's something that is often disappointing, but another disturbing trope in advertising (and it's one that has been going for a while, but seems to be getting worse) is the "stupid man". You don't have to watch many ads on TV before you will see something using some degree of bumbling, incompetent, or outright stupid man to sell a product - often accompanied by a woman who "has it all together" and who has to restate how "we can't even rely on a man for this now can we girls?". Obviously adverts have a short space of time to make a point, but I don't think they should be forgiven for plumbing the depths quite as often as they do.

There are a few things that seem to get included under the umbrella of 'sexism', so here's how I see them:

Body Image
Not sure this is really a valid concern...I see some people claim that characters like Lara Croft, Lightning, females in fighting games etc perpetuate unrealistic body images. Maybe they are unrealistic, but so are most things in videogames. Same goes for male characters and their often massive builds, which seem a lot more unrealistic/unattainable than the female characters. I'm not sure that the number of people being influenced by this is that big, or that people see a character in a game and think "I should look like that!". I don't think every character should be of normal proportions, as that's part of what makes videogames different and fun, being able to exaggerate and distort, etc. If there is an issue, it seems to me to be balanced between male and female characters.

Gender Imbalance
Another claim is that there are more male protagonists than female protagonists. I'm sure there are, but I'm not convinced it's an issue. I don't play the game for the protagonist, and it doesn't bother me whether I'm playing as a man, a woman, an animal, a spaceship or a square. When I was a child/teenager and probably at my most easily-influenced, was I think about the sex of the protagonist, or aspiring to be like them? No, and I don't imagine many kids these days are either. I played, and do play, plenty of games with female leads, and it made/makes no difference to anything. Could there be more female leads? Sure, who cares, I don't see it as an issue at all though. If little girls are crying out for more female leads to aspire to be like or be inspired by (does that really happen?) then sure, do it.

Plot tropes
There used to be a lot of 'save the princess' games, which again has been portrayed as a bad thing and sexist. Do these kind of games exist anymore? I'm not sure that they do, and any examples must be few and far between.

Sex/titilation
I can think of some games that definitely focus on sexualising women, or if they don't focus on it, certainly have elements of it. It's not really necessary, and I can't think of any games that have the same focus on men, so sure, it's an issue, but I think those games are in a minority. They could disappear and it wouldn't bother me, can't think of an example where it adds anything positive to the game.

In summary I think there are some issues that could be looked at and addressed, but I'm not convinced that there's a major problem. I definitely disagree with the original assertion that most games are sexist.

Jenuall wrote:As stated previously sexism is also about much more than sex. Going back to the topic of advertising, yes there are far more examples of women being used as eye candy in advertising and that's something that is often disappointing, but another disturbing trope in advertising (and it's one that has been going for a while, but seems to be getting worse) is the "stupid man". You don't have to watch many ads on TV before you will see something using some degree of bumbling, incompetent, or outright stupid man to sell a product - often accompanied by a woman who "has it all together" and who has to restate how "we can't even rely on a man for this now can we girls?". Obviously adverts have a short space of time to make a point, but I don't think they should be forgiven for plumbing the depths quite as often as they do.

Thankfully last week the ASA announced a crackdown on adverts like that, so we should see them disappear. Muller are notorious for making adverts featuring semi-naked/completely nude men being mocked, and few people seem to bat an eyelid. A lot of adverts aimed at women (cleaning products, yoghurts, sanitary towels, low-calorie snacks, etc) love the whole incompetent man/objectifying men thing. The double-standards are insane.

Lotus wrote:Gender Imbalance
Another claim is that there are more male protagonists than female protagonists. I'm sure there are, but I'm not convinced it's an issue. I don't play the game for the protagonist, and it doesn't bother me whether I'm playing as a man, a woman, an animal, a spaceship or a square. When I was a child/teenager and probably at my most easily-influenced, was I think about the sex of the protagonist, or aspiring to be like them? No, and I don't imagine many kids these days are either. I played, and do play, plenty of games with female leads, and it made/makes no difference to anything. Could there be more female leads? Sure, who cares, I don't see it as an issue at all though. If little girls are crying out for more female leads to aspire to be like or be inspired by (does that really happen?) then sure, do it.

Do you not feel that as a dude you might have a bit of a skewed perspective on whether too many games focus on male heroes? Lots of games rely on self-insertion, so it might get a bit grating being a woman and having to play as big muscular guys all the time.

I think games are getting better for this, lots of games now give you a choice what you want your avatar to look like, but it shouldn't be dismissed as an issue. Obviously from a feminism perspective it's not women-can't-vote levels of important but it might still be annoying or offputting, no?

Maybe. I'm sure there are guys out there who see it as an issue (like you) and I'm sure there are women who don't see it as an issue, as well as those who do. Not sure anyone is right or wrong, and like I say I've no issue with increasing the number of female leads. To me there seems a decent enough spread that if it grates that much you can pick another game.

Can't we just solve this issue by releasing special editions of the consoles that are pink?

Tafdolphin wrote:

Death's Head wrote:

Tafdolphin wrote:

Death's Head wrote:Yes, but this is just how things are unfortunately. Sex is added to everything. Look at movies from the 50s compared to today, no actress was expected to get their kit off. Look at music, imagine a song in the 50s or 60s mentioning sex or an LP with the word "strawberry float" on. Why should we expect any other form of entertainment to not pander to the same market?

Sex sells.

Common misconception: sexism isn't just about sex. It's about gender. Sure, "sex sells" and that's a mantra that's every bit as true today as it was in the 50s, but this doesn't cover aspects of sexism such as the under-representation of women in games. Check the graphs in the mic article: female protags are few and far between, although as Skippy says that is improving. Remember The Last Night, set in a world where "feminism won" and where equality and plenty is seen as a negative.

I can't think of many games where time is spent sexing up the male characters. Sex sells, but not the male sex variety.

Yeah but "sex sells" has never, ever applied to men when talking about advertising in general. Also, it looks like you're responding to something I wasn't trying to say. I was trying to say that your reply was all about sexualisation. Sexism is about more than that.

what? have you ever picked up any sort of trash magazine and the amount of nude beefcake guys selling perfume, or guys in boxers with giant bulges advertising something?!