My friend just shared the recent story about feminist vlogger Anita
Sarkeesian who did a two-part series about misogyny in video games, and
then received such rabid death threats that she had to flee her own
home. You can read about it here (or watch those two videos here and here).
The irony that these death threats came because these men were offended
by her accusations that video games promote violence against women was
not lost on the writers at Jezebel. Indeed, Sarkeesian even said in her
first vlog that the people who most adamantly believe they are not
affected by video game violence are usually the ones who ARE the most
affected. And I'll just warn you right now-- do NOT read the threats. I
didn't even know people could be so disgusting.
I've
only watched the first video so far-- even as an educational tool, it's
certainly not something I could watch with the kids around-- but I was
horrified by the way women are portrayed in some of these video games--
not only was it degrading and pornographic, it was also so blatant in
its promotion of violence against women. (Using prostitutes for
"powering up" or gaining new lives, and then shooting them so you could
collect the money you'd spent on them back again???? How could this
possibly be okay???)
Now, obviously, I would never EVER
let my kids play video games with ratings like these. But still. I
didn't even know filth like this existed.
One more HUGE strike against video games and the gaming world in general.
And I already pretty much hated it all.
3 comments:
That is really terrible to find out-I didn't realize they there that bad.
Yeah, our kids won't be allowed anywhere near those games. But even your basic games aren't great, feminism-wise. It's definitely something that makes me uneasy about them. I loved her videos. Ryan and I also watched a video by someone he had respected that was trying to refute her first video (Thunderf00t, I believe). And it was totally infuriating and frustrating. His arguments were weak and tired (things every feminist has refuted a million times over). I guess watching his video was a good critical thinking exercise, to dismantle his arguments, but I couldn't believe how emotional he got about it all because his beloved games were being "attacked", despite her many statements of "being aware of these problems doesn't mean you have to hate games".
I hate video games. I really do. I didn't know about the games you mentioned, but now I hate video games even more.
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