“When he read to me–stupid things, dragons and heroes–he wouldn’t turn a page until I reached over and took his hand. That big man made every step of the story my choice. I loved that.” — Aveline, regarding her father
(Dragon Age 2 spoilers)
Crossposted at The Border House.
Last weekend, March 25-27, was the first annual PAX East convention. The Penny Arcade Expo has been running for several years in Seattle, but this is the first time it has come to the East Coast, and the first time I was able to attend. I’m going to write a few posts about the various panels I went to and the overall experience, and the first thing I would like to address is the “Girls in Gaming” panel that took place on Friday night.
The panel consisted of: Brittany Vincent (Editor-in-Chief, Spawn Kill), Julie Furman (Founder, SFX360), Alexis Hebert (Community Relations Manager, Terminal Reality), Padma Fuller (Product Marketing Manager, Sanrio Digital), and Kate Paiz (Senior Producer, Turbine), with Jeff Kalles of Penny Arcade moderating. The format was entirely Q&A, with no discussion and only short introductions before opening up the floor to questions. So it did not begin very well, though this was entirely the fault of the organizers.
This week’s Context Clues went up today and it gave me quite a bit of food for thought. Although it (rightfully) focuses on both Modern Warfare 2 controversies from last week, there are a few articles about gender and sexism in games. The thing is, three out of the four posts were written by men. It’s problematic when men’s voices dominate a discussion of gender and sexism (unless the topic is specifically masculinity, but that was not the case here).
This isn’t the first time this has happened, either. Both of these “This Week In Video Game Blogging” posts discuss topics related to women and games yet link only to reactions by men to those topics. Critical Distance’s Grand Theft Auto IV Compilation references “genuinely-offended feminists” but the only linked posts that bring up the misogyny in the game are written by men. This Experience Points post makes two mistakes, first suggesting that social criticism of games is a new thing (when Shrub and Token Minorities have been around for years: since 2005 and 2006, respectively), and secondly linking to a post by a white man (ETA: correction, a non-POC Jewish man, see comments for clarification) as an example of writing about gender and race in games (no offense, Simon!).
And really, I didn’t find any of the posts about gender by men to be wrong or offensive or anything–most are actually pretty good. That’s not the point. The point here is the gaming blogosphere only seems to take notice of topics like gender when it’s men who are doing the writing. And that perpetuates sexist dynamics even as the people involved are denouncing sexism.
But that’s not quite what I was thinking about today as I read the posts linked in Context Clues. Dudes taking notice of sexism and saying “hey, this is bad, you guys!” isn’t a bad thing–it’s a sign of progress. Opinions vary on this, but personally, I would rather guys wrote about sexism than not, if only because the more voices speaking out, the better. But as the title says, progress doesn’t come without sexism of its own.
This is where my mixed reactions come in. When I read an article about sexism by a man (or a person of any gender, really) and he makes good points and seems to mostly get it, I’m happy. And yet, particularly now with this upswell of men talking about women and games, I’m also thinking “fucking finally,” and, “but why the hell didn’t they listen to me or people I know the million times we’ve said the same damn thing?”
This was the excerpt Erik chose to highlight from one of the posts, Self-destructive sexualism by Evan Stubbs:
Depressingly frequently we, as men, seem to want it all ways; we want women to be knowledgeable and “one of the guys”, but at the same time we claim to appreciate “a woman’s perspective” when it comes to games. We don’t want them to call attention to their femininity, as that would be manipulative marketing, but “we’d hit it” and we won’t watch, read, or listen if “she’s fugly”. We like hearing about the things they enjoyed, but we don’t want to hear about all that non-core crap like Peggle and The Sims. Somehow, we want our women to be nurturing and supportive of our interests, to be overtly sexy, and, as impossible as it is, to be pure and virginal.
This is a good point, but at the same time the idea that women are held to impossible standards and simply cannot win is also something that feminists have been saying for decades. Why is this being treated as an important, unique insight?
And this is not meant to be a dig at either Erik or Evan. Evan makes a lot of great points in his post–and he does link to posts by women–and I’m glad I found it through the Context Clues round-up. The problem is it’s nothing new, it’s stuff that women have been talking about for a long time. But now that it’s a guy saying it, people pay attention.
I said on Twitter, “I totally appreciate dudes writing about sexism in games, but it’s a bit frustrating to see old ideas treated like revelations, heh.” And though I didn’t have room to describe in a nuanced manner how I feel exactly and why, I still got some thoughtful comments from my friends. Ryan Gan and Justin Keverne both pointed out how being very knowledgeable on any subject and discussing that subject with newbs is frustrating. And while that is absolutely true–and is certainly part of my frustration sometimes, like when I’m explaining what male privilege is for the billionth time–it’s not the whole story. The other part of it has to do with what I’ve described above: continuing and changing sexist dynamics that exclude women’s voices even as we are making progress with bringing gender issues to wider attention. This problem is a lot more personal than most subjects because it affects me directly; when I talk about women’s voices being excluded, I am one of those women.
So what can be done to help minimize this sort of sexism? The biggest thing is to simply seek out writers from different perspectives. This goes for all social issues, not just gender but sexuality, race, disability, and so on. Reading and linking to writers of different perspectives will help diversify the gaming blogosphere. Also, if you’re writing about a social issue in games, search around and see if it has already been written about, particularly by someone who has personal experience with that issue. If it has been written about, this doesn’t mean you shouldn’t write about it, just that the previous writing should be acknowledged, and it can help to illuminate the issue further.
Another thing–and the Context Clues post helped me to realize this–is to focus on specific instances of sexism or specific games. Evan Stubb’s post uses some specific examples, but it’s a general “games and gamers: really quite sexist!” post. And there’s nothing wrong with that, but it contributes to my frustration for reasons described above. It would be stronger and seem less like old ideas masquerading as new ones if it were focused around a specific incident or game. This post by Chris Dahlen, also linked in this week’s Context Clues, is a decent example of that, using Brutal Legend as the focus of a discussion about romance in games–he even links to two articles by female bloggers (disclaimer: one of them is mine! The other is by Emily Short).
We are making progress, and I’m really glad for that. But we still have a long way to go, and it’s imperative that we always expect more, or this progress we’ve made will stagnate, or even begin to roll backwards.
(UPDATE: The ad has been removed; apparently IW didn’t notice the acronym, which I kind of think is bullshit, but I’m glad action was taken.)
Via Kotaku, a new ad went up on developer Infinity Ward’s YouTube page for the upcoming Modern Warfare 2. The ad features an in-game model of Cole Hamels from the Philadelphia Phillies “speaking out” PSA-style against grenade spamming multiplayer tactics. Along with using misogynist slur “pussies”, at the end of the ad is a caption saying the PSA was done for a fake organization called “Fight Against Grenade Spam”, aka FAGS. In one stupid video, Infinity Ward reinforces misogyny and homophobia and condones the openly homophobic atmosphere of online gaming where such words are used all too often.
Here is a transcript for those who can’t access the video:
[Video opens with in-game footage of a player named “BluntTrauma” (whose gamerpic is a pot leaf) killing another player with a headshot from a sniper rifle.]
Male Voice Over: Let’s take a break from the action to get a word from our sponsor.
[Cole Hamels game model, in fatigues, armor, and a red Phillies cap, closes the door on a Jeep and walks toward the camera.]
Hamels: Hi, I’m Philadelphia Phillies pitcher Cole Hamels. And I’m here today to talk to you about something close to my heart: random grenades. Have you ever found yourself just walking down the street, minding your own business, when BAM! You look down and see a deadly explosive device attached to your uniform? I have, and let me tell you, it’s not cool. So be cool, and avoid random grenades. They’re for pussies.
[A grenade thrown from off-screen sticks to the front of Hamels’s uniform; Hamels looks shocked; a ton more grenades cover him.]
Hamels: What the fuck?
[Hamels explodes. A black screen with white text reads: “Funding Provided By: Fight Against Grenade Spam.”]
VO: Brought to you by: Fight Against Grenade Spam.
And I’m pretty sure the joke about walking down the street only to be attacked by a grenade is totally hilarious to people living in actual warzones, who actually have to worry about being killed by explosives.
More at Hellforge, including an interesting quote from an Infinity Ward dev about how they take responsibility for their marketing. Oh, really?
ETA: Lono from Sarcastic Gamer speaks out, and some analysis from Brainy Gamer.
Vorpal Bunny Ranch has a powerful post about personal experiences with this word.
Deirdra Kiai has a related post about what is truly “edgy.”
ETA2: Sessler’s Soapbox on the issue; Adam explains the precise problems rather well, making the distinction between simple swearing and words that are bad because they marginalize groups of people.
ETA3: Another post on the issue by Amanda Phillips at HASTAC.
Today I was made aware that there were some factual errors in my GTA IV post from May of 2008. Since that post is often linked as a resource in discussing the game (which was my intention in writing it, and it is in fact the first result when Google searching “sexism GTA IV”), I asked some friends who have played the game (and are awesome) to glance it over and point out any errors. I have now corrected those errors.
I find it telling that this request also resulted in more examples of sexism, and now homophobia, to add to the post.
For the most part I seriously enjoyed Mass Effect despite the initial problems I wrote about in my last post. After the first couple of missions I had a handle on the gameplay and was at a point where I had the freedom to shoot things up or have deep conversations with my crew at my own whim. I completed most of the side quests and finished the game wanting more; I immediately began a renegade playthrough, though I did not have time to get very far.
Overall, Mass Effect took huge steps forward for inclusiveness in games. Its racial diversity is unlike any I have seen in a game: nearly all of the major and minor human NPCs are people of color, and none of them are stereotypes. In another impressive step, not only is there an important character–the Normandy’s pilot, Joker–who happens to be disabled, but a conversation with him reveals the many different layers of ableism he has experienced throughout his life. Unfortunately, the game stumbles when it comes to gender inclusiveness. While the game seems quite egalitarian on the surface, notably in the ability to choose whether to play as a male or female character, I have noticed some deep sexism in the world-building (galaxy-building?), some subtle and some not. I will be writing about how the game explicitly addresses sexism, racism, and other social issues in a future post; for now I want to examine how the fiction of the game has been influenced by sexism on the part of the developers.
I. The Alien Race of Women–I Mean, Asari
The Asari are the all-female race of blue aliens that are iconic to the game. The Asari member of Shepard’s crew is Dr. Liara T’Soni, a (relatively) young scientist and possible romantic interest for both male and female Shepard. Liara is a frustrating character because she is likable, but she was clearly designed to be as likable as possible–to a certain type of male gamer. Go on any gaming forum discussing her and there will be multiple posts talking about how hot she is because she is so “innocent.” This perception of her seems to stem from her nervousness when talking to Shepard and her implied virginity.
The positioning of innocence as an attractive trait in women has its roots in patriarchy, related to how patriarchy encourages the infantilization of women: women are portrayed as childlike and unable to make decisions for themselves, necessitating a male protector and provider who knows what’s good for her (thus maintaining patriarchy, despite how insulting and inaccurate this characterization is). The infantilization of women is seen in many aspects of our culture, and a quick Google search turns up examples in law, religion, advertising, and fashion. For this reason, I find the obsession with Liara’s innocence to be creepy, not to mention in contradiction with other aspects of her personality, namely her actual age–over 100–and her extensive experience as a scientist. (For the record, I also think rompers are awful.)
In addition, while some have praised BioWare for including the option of a lesbian relationship in the game, Liara is, frankly, a cop-out, a way to have hot girl-on-girl action for straight men without actually having any gays: both Liara and the codex explain at length how the Asari don’t really have a gender (by which I assume they mean “sex”, since sex and gender are two different things and the Asari are clearly gendered female) and they mate through psychic mind connections. While I don’t think the actual development of the relationship or even the sex scene is outrageously exploitative (though I would note that the sex scene with Liara is slightly longer, with more nudity than the others), when contrasting the romance options for male and female Shepard, I found the lack of a romance option between two men to be conspicuous. The absence of a gay male romance, which is due at least in part to the gaming community’s reputation as a notoriously homophobic space, implies that the female Shepard/Liara romance is mostly for straight male titillation rather than a concern for the inclusion of LGBTQI folks.
Obviously, my problems with how one Asari character is written shouldn’t condemn an entire species, but the Asari as a race are also problematic. In short, they are every female stereotype or cliche rolled up into one new species. According to the codex, the Asari have three stages of life: the Maiden, the Mother, and the Matriarch (otherwise known on Earth as the “crone”). These stages just so happen to correspond with what were, until fairly recently though arguably still today, the three acceptable roles for women in society. Making these archetypes an explicit aspect of an alien race that just happens to be all-female is at worst sexist and at best lazy and uncreative.
In addition, the Asari are sexualized to a much farther extent than any other species (partially as a result of point two, below). The first Asari the player meets in the game is called the “Consort,” and yes, she runs what amounts to a brothel: clients meet her for her “services,” which may or may not be sex. Walking through the Consort’s chambers, the player overhears nervous aliens telling the Consort’s aides that this is their “first time.” While the consort is not explicitly a prostitute, the situation is clearly meant to humorously resemble a brothel. The player can also watch Asari strippers dance at the club called Chora’s Den. Thirdly, Liara and the codex both describe how Asari can mate with any intelligent being through a sort of psychic mind-meld. Now, I am all for science fiction experimenting with different kinds of sexuality and sexual practices, but this is another case of pandering to straight men. It’s no coincidence that the all-female race is the one that can mate with anybody.*
Even Matriarch Benezia, one of the most powerful and wise beings in the galaxy, is sexualized. She had to have huge breasts and a revealing outfit because even though she is old and powerful, she still needs to be sexy, as the primary purpose of the Asari (just like women here on Earth) is to be attractive to straight men. Their second purpose is to serve men: as Liara drops her research to serve Shepard, as the Consort serves her clients, as the dancers serve the bar’s patrons, Benezia serves Saren and Sovereign. This turns her into a villain, but not even a willing one–she loses all agency because of Sovereign’s mind control, breaking it just enough to tell her daughter that she is not worth saving.
In another frustrating move, the Asari are known for their skills with Biotics, Mass Effect‘s science fiction version of magic. This isn’t a problem in and of itself, but in the context of video games as a medium and RPGs in particular, there is a sexist trend of always putting women in the role of magic user, with few exceptions, ever since White Mage was the only female character in the original Final Fantasy. The codex also pays lip service to Asari Commandos, who are described as extremely deadly; the player encounters them in one battle in the entire game, during which they didn’t nearly live up to the hype.
As another detail that serves to emphasize how stereotypically feminine the Asari are supposed to be, the Asari member of the Council is representative of compassion and diplomacy. Where the Turian member represents military action and strength, and the Salarian represents intelligence and strategy, both men, the Asari member of the Council is the only woman and occupies the traditional role of women: peacemaker. Because she’s so good at understanding peoples’ feelings. Again, this isn’t bad in and of itself, but combined with all the other ways in which the Asari are stereotypically feminine, it belies the sexist assumptions about women in the mind of the people who created them, namely that the creators buy into gender essentialist arguments about how women are. (That article even cites the sexist and simply wrong idea behind the arrangement of the Council [emphasis original]: “A common corollary belief is that while men are physically and rationally superior, women are morally superior.”)
The Asari are the only alien species in the game with visible females, so they were made to be “hyper-female”, encompassing the stereotypical roles for human women. This is not only sexist and gender essentialist but a failure of imagination: why would an alien race conform to our (incorrect, arbitrary) human assumptions about what women are or should be? Good science fiction challenges our deepest-held assumptions, including those about gender, femininity and masculinity. With the Asari, Mass Effect only reinforces the idea that all women are a certain way, and that way should be as pleasing to straight men as possible.
II. Why Are There No Ugly Female Aliens?
In general, the portrayal of women in Mass Effect is better than many games. It meets the required minimum of having female characters that aren’t hypersexualized: they have relatively realistic proportions and their clothing is appropriately similar to the male characters’, for the most part. There remains, however, a notable discrepancy between men and women in the galaxy of the game: all the women are hot, but not all of the men are.
Look at the varied body types we see among male aliens in the game. In addition to the humans (most of whom, I will grant, are meant to be attractive–Kaiden certainly is), we see the lizard-like Turians, the hulking and reptilian Krogan, the large and cattle-like Elcor, the amphibian Salarians, the squat Volus, and the jellyfish-like Hanar.
All the female aliens present in the game, aside from a single female Quarian (who I will get to in a moment), are Asari**. The Asari, a species with all the issues I outlined above, that seem to be a space representation of femininity. This is Othering via world-building: male is the default for most races, but the ones that have females at all are so female they encompass female archetypes, run brothels, strip in bars, and have sex with anyone and anything.
Go ahead and do a word search for “female” on those Wikia articles linked above. It isn’t even mentioned on the Elcor or Volus pages; the only mention on the Hanar page is to say that there is “no discernible difference” between male and female Hanar, which is only problematic because of human sexism–see the side note about gender presentation below.
The only mention of “female” on the Krogan page is how all the Krogan females are on the Krogan homeworld trying to have as many babies as possible. Convenient! The only mention of “female” on the Salarian page is to note that the species is 90% male, and the females also all stay on the Salarian kitchen–I mean, home word, but it’s okay because they are all powerful politicians. Of course, this means they needn’t appear in the game. How convenient!
The only mention of “female” on the page about the Turians is in the “trivia” section, and it says: “No female turians are seen in the game. This is because there was insufficient development time and memory budget to support two different versions of the same species.”
This explains everything. The reason the stuff about Krogan and Salarian females seems like convenient excuses is because they are: when time and budget were tight, the non-hot females were the first to go. Other than humans, there was only room for one model for each species, and for the most part, the females were disposed of–except for Tali, the only Quarian in the entire game. Having only males did not stop the developers from having many Turian and Krogan NPCs, so why does the player never encounter even one other female Quarian? I mean, other than the convenient excuse that all the Quarians never venture outside of their own fleet (except when they do). Tali is saved from the chopping block because, unlike Turian or Krogan females, she is acceptably attractive: she has an hourglass figure, a sexy accent, and her mask allows fans to imagine that she has a face like their favorite actress.
The absence of something as insignificant as females may be explained, but that doesn’t mean it is excused. And it certainly doesn’t mean that Mass Effect‘s depiction of a galactic society where every single woman, both alien and human, just so happens to have a humanoid body a supermodel would be jealous of isn’t sexist, messed up, and wrong.
A side note on gender presentation
The thing that kills me about the “we didn’t have time to make any females!” excuse is that there is no real reason male and female Turians, for example, couldn’t look just alike above their clothes. Not all animals on Earth have sexual dimorphism; why should all aliens?
Technically some of those Turian or Krogan or Hanar NPCs in the game could be female, despite having deep voices and no breasts. There is no reason an alien society should have the same ideas about femininity or masculinity as we do (or have such ideas at all!). The catch is, only humans are playing Mass Effect; therefore, any creature lacking sufficient feminine markers are going to be assumed (in this unfortunate case, correctly) to be male. The developers could, however, have easily challenged players’ ideas about femininity by casually referring to the ugly, deep-voiced Elcor ambassador as “she”.
As I said above, good science fiction challenges our most basic assumptions. Unfortunately, Mass Effect is not good science fiction. In fact, it seems to embrace our own societal “common wisdom” about women and femininity all too wholeheartedly. I can only hope someone on the development team has read Ursula K. LeGuin’s The Left Hand of Darkness or some Octavia Butler before writing Mass Effect 2.
* One thing I do find interesting about the Asari is the idea that “purebloods”–Asari who mate with other Asari–are lesser, as they don’t bring anything new to the species. It’s an interesting inversion of the “Mudblood” idea; the term is from Harry Potter, but it’s a common trope in fantasy: see the vast number of stories about half-elves angsting that they don’t belong to either the elf or human cultures.
** Some may object that the Rachni Queen is a female “ugly” alien; while this is true, they aren’t part of Citadel culture in any way; they aren’t meant to be seen as equal to humans or the other intelligent species. Not only that, but, as an insectoid species, the Rachni Queen’s only purpose is to breed lots of children–quite patriarchal. Also, one exception does not outweigh the six other species that are “ugly” and all male.
Thank you to Kateri, Simon Ferrari, and Ryan Gan for their help in the preparation of this post.
When I first started playing Mass Effect last week, I hated it. This is one game that makes a terrible first impression and probably loses players because of it.
After creating my character and watching a brief opening, I found myself thrust onto an alien planet with my two squadmates, and, after a tutorial that was at once bare-bones and overwhelming, I was killed by some disgusting reanimated corpses. Try again!
On a second attempt I made it through the area and came upon a couple of NPCs to talk to; I rushed through the dialogue since I was eager to learn more about the combat and how to actually play the game. The next area was more difficult, and I ended up dying again.
Just as I felt I was getting a hang of the combat, the level was over and it was back to cutscenes and dialogue. When I regained control of Shepard, she was in the office of the human ambassador at the Citadel, the major city of the game. This began a three-hour-long segment of running around talking to people, listening to exposition, and gathering my crew, all while I was itching to get back into the action.
To say the least, it takes a while to get used to Mass Effect‘s pacing.
The game had other problems at the start, too. While I was thrilled to be able to play as a female character, I was worried there would be a Fallout 3 sort of situation where the dialogue for the female character wouldn’t make sense, or other characters would refer to me as “he.” This fear came about because of a scene at the beginning where Shepard is talking to her two human squadmates about humanity’s place at the Citadel, and includes “beautiful women” on her list of “things humanity has to offer aliens”. Really, now? I could see how a heterosexual man might say this, but why would a woman objectify herself, reduce herself to a commodity that could be used to appease aliens? (Not to mention it is a nonsensical comment–all aliens are heterosexual males or lesbians who are attracted to human women that meet our own arbitrary beauty standards? That’s a lot of assumptions!) I found it hard to believe any woman would say that, let alone the Commander Shepard I was playing, who threatened a man at a bar for calling her “princess.” Fortunately, this is the only instance of dissonance so far I have seen between my character as I play her and what she says.
The first major alien species you really get to know is the Asari; I have so many problems with this group that they will be getting their own post. For now I will just say they are a strange, dark mark on what is otherwise an impressively inclusive game.
In particular, the game excels at racial inclusiveness. You can choose the race of your character–and you aren’t limited to white/black/Latin@/Asian like in Fallout 3–and many important and minor NPCs are people of color: both of your human squadmates, Captain Anderson, and the human ambassador are people of color. You help out a reporter named Emily Wong. You meet a South Asian man mourning for his wife, who died in combat. Many NPCs also have accents, like the British doctor on your crew and the Dutch medic at the Citadel. Mass Effect makes it clear that in the far future, all humans will be welcome, not just white Americans.
This inclusiveness is part of what kept me playing the game through all the endless dialogue, and I’m very glad I did, because now I’m really enjoying it. Having settled into the proper pace, and finally coming to terms with the combat, the game has actually become quite fun. The story is intriguing, the characters three-dimensional, and the flirting hilariously awkward. I’m looking forward to playing through the rest of it and writing about it here.
You know, this update wouldn’t have been necessary if they had at least one woman on staff.
The apology is cute. I didn’t find the glaring omission offensive, I was just really goddamn annoyed at being an afterthought yet again. It’s little things like these that are so revealing, reminding everyone that in video game land, it’s nothing but a boys’ club, no girls allowed.
(ETA: Since the first update has been deleted, I’ll clarify what happened: the original post contained a gallery of screenshots and a plain list of “all” the items in the Avatar Marketplace, but it wasn’t actually all the items, just the male ones. Later on in the day the post was updated to say that they were working on getting pictures of the female items, saying that they were sorry “for offending any female Avatars.” Some time this evening the post was updated with the pictures and the current update notice.)
Alternate post title: Alex Explains the Joke So It’s Not Funny Anymore!
Okay, so. There have been many instances where a person who is white and/or a dude has said some mind-bogglingly racist and/or sexist things, and when called out on it they claim that they are so not racist/sexist! It was SATIRE. This happens all the time. Many of these are actual racist/sexist jerks trying to defend themselves in any way possible. HOWEVER, I have found out that it is entirely possible that these white people and/or guys are, in fact, well-meaning and did actually intend for their racist/sexist comments to be satire!
This is similar to “hipster racism/sexism” as it is called in some parts of the internet, where a person tells racist or sexist jokes in order to show how NOT racist and/or sexist they are. Because it is ironic, right? Like wearing a Fall Out Boy shirt to show how much you think they suck? Except with the oppression that people have to deal with every day.
I never understood the logic behind such jokes, or all the not-really-satire… UNTIL RECENTLY! And it’s not that the people saying these things don’t understand what satire is.
The logic–and let me preface this by saying that I still think this stuff is damaging and just bad satire–is that the people who make these jokes or say these things in the name of satire think that saying something like, say, “this game sucks because a woman made it” is sufficiently ridiculous enough to be laughable. The problem is the people who say these things are too privileged to see that other people say exactly the racist/sexist crap they are supposedly saying “ironically”, but with a straight face, or simply a nasty veneer of joking. They don’t realize–because of privilege–that racism and sexism are still very much mainstream. It’s ridiculous to us, but there are plenty of people out there who believe these things, and that fact still affects us daily.
One reason it doesn’t work is that, when you have a person of color saying something racist about their own group, or a woman saying something misogynist, the sarcasm is a lot clearer because they are talking about themselves (even women with internalized sexism generally count themselves as exceptional, or “not one of THOSE women”). You don’t have this extra “sarcasm indicator” when it is a white person saying racist things or a dude saying sexist things.
The other reason is that there’s generally no criticism of what is being said. There is a lead-up but no payoff. The racist or sexist comments are just put out there without any real absurdity or criticism. For a great and succinct example of this, see this paragraph from the Girl vs. Robot post about #EAFail:
Women don’t like science fiction, Peter Jackson (who you got to meet), or comics. They just don’t. Let’s settle that right now. All those women you’ve met who like all of those things were robots. Robots created by the feminist conspiracy to fool you.
It’s pretty much perfect. It starts out with a stupid sexist remark that a surprising number of people actually believe, and then it goes on show how absurd that remark is (although I’m sure there are some people out there who believe in robot feminist conspiracies, most don’t–a sufficient level of ridiculousness has been met, you could say). The intent is crystal clear: to make people who believe the first sentence feel stupid.*
Racism and sexism are quite stupid, really. This type of humor tries to show just how stupid it is, in a funny way. But if racists and/or misogynists are laughing along with you (and not in an embarrassed chuckle sort of way), you’re doing it wrong. Simply repeating racist or sexist comments isn’t enough to be funny or satirical, it just makes non-racist or -sexist people uncomfortable.
This is an excellent example, about romantic comedies, that happened to be posted today! Or hell, just read Sady’s entire blog already. I recommend this one.
EDIT: Silly me, Sociological Images already has it covered! Have I mentioned how awesome that blog is? It is awesome.
* I am so sorry for ruining your awesome joke, Derek!
#EAFail is a total clusterfuck of misogyny and pandering to the lowest common denominator. Here are a bunch of resources on it. (Last updated August 3 at 10:00 PM EST.)
GayGamer’s PixelPoet entered the contest with a photo of himself and a “booth bear” in order to make a point. He ended up being selected as a runner-up winner and sending an amazing letter explaining exactly why he was declining the prize, pointing out the heteronormativity and sexism of the contest and giving suggestions for what to do with the prize instead. Read it, seriously!
Acid for Blood: Convention Sexual Harassment and #EAFail — in-depth analysis by Brinstar
General Posts
Ars Technica post explaining the situation.
The Escapist also reports on the situation.
AdFreak’s post against the contest. (H/T Brinstar in comments.)
GamingAngels points out that the hub-bub over the “male only” IGN contest should have tipped them off (H/T Brinstar):
Alright, I get it. The game is about the 7 Deadly Sins, one of them being Lust. And sure, this is one of the easiest (aside from Sloth) sins to use to promote the game. But really? After the debacle with the IGN contest recently wouldn’t at least do a little thinking about the audience – not to mention the ‘booth babes’? The contest is specific in stating “any booth babe” so, this isn’t even about the girls that might be at the Dante’s Inferno area – which means every girl working a booth at the Con is fair game in their eyes.
Negative Gamer tears the contest apart (H/T Brinstar!):
In their continuingly desperate plea for people to care about their game, EA have taken to just being bigots. In a competition being held at Comic-Con you have to “commit an act of lust” with one of their booth babes, then post the picture on twitter.The winner gets a “sinfull night with two hot girls” (the quote should technically be in all caps, but I thought you may not be able to handle it).
Even Destructoid thinks the contest is sleazy (H/T @sephiros):
On the other hand, there’s something repulsive about offering people up as prizes in your PR stunt, especially given game culture’s bad habit of over-sexualizing its female characters anyway. And while our beautiful free market ideally allows booth babes to opt out of stunts like this at their discretion, let’s be realistic: living in California ain’t cheap and the rent still has to get paid. Even if there’s nothing technically wrong going on here, it’s still sleazy and, at the very least, alienating.
MetaFilter post (H/T Pearl in the comments.)
Technology News: “EA’s Big Success at Comic-Con This Year? Alienating Women Gamers” (Same article at Wired’s GeekDad.) (Same article at Coolbeans.)
More links care of Brinstar:
Post on LJ comm sf_drama.
Post by LJ user yendi
JournalFen community unfunnybusiness
Post on FF site Limit Break
OffWorld
.tiff
Jezebel: “Not only is this promotion gross and a bit sad, it also reinforces the notion that everyone at Comic Con is a horny douchebag loser who just wants to rub up against a Booth Babe for a cheap thrill.”
Kotaku: “The contest details, emblazoned on the chest of a woman in faux tattoo, also offers five runner-up prizes which includes a copy of the game, a $240 EA gift card, a limited edition shirt and ‘tons more swag.’ No word if that swag includes brass knuckles.”
LJ comm girl_gamers: “EA must not think highly of male gamers… and they don’t seem to think anything at all of female gamers.”
Technologizer: “If only the gaming blogs covering the story could see the forest from the trees. Destructoid, for example, cries foul despite having no problem celebrating booth babes during E3.”
Newsarama: “What NOT to do at SDCC”
Kotaku post about @danteteam’s failpology.
Broken Toys. And here’s a follow up:
And I apologize for any confusion in how I worded my belief that your marketing team was devoid of common sense, views its female employees as sexual objects, and reflects poorly on our entire industry in its juvenile pursuit of attention.
Kill Ten Rats: “EA, when I talked about game developers and porn stars, I was not implying that you should treat your employees like underpaid prostitutes.” Here is the follow up.
Jeremy Preacher:
I’ve worked Comic-Con. and while there are lots of perfectly normal, well-adjusted people there, there are also a LOT of people with boundary issues, an imperfect understanding of social norms, and/or a really fucking twisted view of women. It’s hard enough to maintain one’s personal space – having fucking Marketing supporting the random gropage as a CONTEST does NOT HELP.
Edmonton Journal‘s Button Mash: ”
EA Games pimp out booth babes at Comic-Con, the Internet explodes”
Geeks Are Sexy
Social Media Today post describing what went wrong WRT using Twitter as a contest platform. (Same post on Social Media Guidelines.)
Pope Hat post on the legal issues involved: “‘Acts of Lust’ At Comic Con: Electronic Arts Wants To Make Some Lawyers Very Happy”:
Employers have an obligation to take reasonable steps to protect employees from sexual harassment by customers and other third parties. They also have an obligation to refrain from encouraging and ratifying such harassment. This is a briskly developing area of law. And while EA might plausibly argue (as have employers like Hooters, for instance) that being ogled is part and parcel of the Booth Babe job, they’re going to have a tough time explaining how Booth Babes signed up to be exposed to ill-defined “acts of lust.”
Tradeskill Perspective talks about organizations such as Women in Games and Gamers in Real Life (GIRL) that try to raise awareness about issues relating to women in games and the industry.
Set on Stun: “Misogyny Marketing: EA Pimps Booth Babes for Dante’s Inferno Game”
VG247
Get Your Blogs Out
DigitalFemme: “The next person to tell me that the only thing a company is looking for in a consumer’s pants is a wallet or that the only color a company sees is green is going to get told off. For days. Because time and time again this has been proven to be untrue.”
Spinksville
dwell on it: “Booth-babes though, as a marketing gimmick, are just insulting. I’ve got nothing at all against the women who do the work. It’s a job like any other – and not an easy job by any means – and people are paying for it. But really, the whole notion that they have to be there is an insult to gamers, and to game journos – whether or not that insult is actually warranted.”
Kellie Parker succinctly explains the sexism and heteronormativity of the contest.
Blippitt: “#EAFail: Video Game Marketing Gone Bad”
Shack News
Carnal Nation: “#EAFail – Is EA Games Deliberately Being Crass For The Publicity?”
At Mother Jones, Stephanie Volkoff Green investigates which other circles of hell EA manages to fall into with this contest.
Geek Syndicate‘s post. (H/T jeffy in comments.)
Yahoo! Games’s PluggedIn: “EA blasted over questionable marketing stunt”; this post made Yahoo’s top 4 news articles. (H/T @BigDumbHippy)
Joystiq: “Photos of the booth girls and their potential “dates” can be found on the Dante’s Inferno Facebook page. Our faith in humanity can be found in the corner, curled up and mumbling something to itself.” And the follow up: “We can’t imagine Beelzebub begs pardon from those he makes swim through a sea of fire and brimstone for all eternity. ‘Oh, man. That looks like it hurts. I’m like, really sorry about this, guys. Do you want some aloe?'”
Penny Arcade weighs in:
Now, Electronic Arts seems determined to wrest the title of “most egregious promotional bullshit” from the Acclaim of old, with some crazy Comic Con antics that involve committing “acts of lust” on “booth babes.” They apologized, ostensibly, but it’s a mealymouthed, worthless thing – a recitation of what they’ve done, capped with the assertion that they’re sorry you’re offended, but not sorry for offending you, as though your reaction were some bizarre, extra-dimensional phenomenon independent of their own actions.
Kieron Gillen at Rock, Paper, Shotgun decries the contest, describing a couple stories of con-goers harassing his friends at SDCC:
On the first day, a Photographer friend of ours wandered over, sighing that she’d already had her arse pinched four times.
This is what comicon is like without a multinational corporation deciding to turn it into a sport.
Feminist Responses
A comment on Ars Technica by an actual “booth babe” with firsthand experience of con harassment (H/T Brinstar). Here is an excerpt, but be sure to read the whole thing:
Lastly, you guys think that people offended by this are over-reacting because SANE people at a con would never do something criminal? Spoken like someone who’s not female and dressed up at a con. Last week I had some moron ACTUALLY STALK one of my new girls. Kept coming back to the booth even after she told him she wouldn’t hang out. He kept getting more insistent that she hang out with him and give him her phone number. Kept telling her he’d come back when she asked him not to. Tried to FOLLOW HER. Yah, that’s obviously not dangerous AT ALL. I’ve had my own issues over the years, including stalkers, men trying to take invasive photos, or grabbing things they shouldn’t. I have at least a couple of guys a con who cross the line. Please don’t downplay the seriousness of a situation that you know NOTHING ABOUT.
Here is the Kotaku post about iola’s comment. It’s good that it’s getting so much attention.
Shakesville post about it. From a comment by trifling:
One particular horror of this is that entrants to the competition are encouraged to “(take) photos with the models working the Dante’s Inferno booth or any other booth babes at the show.” Forgive my potential lack of understanding of the operation of the event, but I am pretty sure that the tone of this competition is encouraging more than the average “stand next to her and smile” photo, and they are encouraging this interaction with people who do not work for them or have any association at all with this competition.
A Midwife in Training post about how she mostly buys EA games but will now be boycotting them:
I’m loving the fact that EA seems to think that my gender isn’t interested in their video games or winning contests for free swag. Or that I wouldn’t be offended that they’ve declared open season on the “booth babes”, essentially reinforcing the misguided idea that harassing or “lusting” after a woman, and then snapping a picture of it for proof, is a great way to get her to spend some time with you.
EA is not only condoning behavior that dehumanizes women, but they are encouraging and rewarding it. This is socially irresponsible and morally repugnant. I don’t bring up morals a whole lot because I think it’s kind of a dicey subject, but this one kind of pushes me over the edge. We live in a rape culture and this kind of a contest reinforces that. I know that these models likely went into this job knowing about this contest, but I also know that some of the women to take booth babe jobs really need the jobs, regardless of how degrading they are (it’s better than stripping or worse, right?) and that women are told that being objectified is good for them (when we know, scientifically, that it’s not). Saying that it’s ok because they went into it with their eyes open doesn’t make it better.
The F-Word: “EA games invites convention attendees to sexually harass ‘booth babes'”
Feminist Law Professors: “EA has a new way to annoy its own models: give out prizes for Comic Con attendees who commit acts of lust with their booth babes. Also, if you win, you get to take the lady out to dinner! This is going to end well for everyone involved.”
Girl vs. Robot: (H/T Kat in the comments.) This is a great post that outlines the sexism faced by girls and women in nerd-dom:
The problem is that gamer girls are nerds too. They feel the same pressure to conform to mainstream society that male nerds do. However, when they reject it and flee to the communities of nerds online, they often are faced with a second pressure to behave in a certain way, whether that be the hyper anime girl ideal or the “one of the guys” anti-girl. Girl gamers are just looking for a place to be themselves.
YES, YES, YES. That is it exactly. (Also the third paragraph is an excellent example of satirizing sexism. The sarcasm is quite clear and the statement truly ridiculous.)
Feministing Community: “EA Fail: How to Alienate Female Gamers”
As I’ve said many, many times before… I am not against being pretty or sexy, or whatever. I am not against finding people hot. I AM against setting up your employees for sexual harassment, and probably some sexual assault as well. People, male or female, have a tendency to behave badly when feeling anonymous in a crowd. Add that to this society’s view of women’s bodies as objects and public property, then give them permission to engage in one level of bad behavior… The stupid starts to stack up pretty quickly.
Other Resources
Brinstar’s screencap of @danteteam’s now-removed response (now re-posted?) to the Twitter outrage.
TweetGrid search for #EAFail, this can be used to keep up with the latest developments on Twitter. Responses should also be under the hashtag #lust and as replies to @danteteam.
Via Brinstar, two posts on harassment, containing specific stories of incidents of harassment. This stuff HAPPENS, and it happens A LOT:
Bully Says: Comics Oughta Be Fun!
Cerise article on con harassment and Girl-Wonder’s Con Anti-Harassment Project.
More on harassment at last year’s SDCC
In addition, this stunt has serious shades of the “Open Source Boob Project” debacle from last year. More analysis here.
If you have any more posts or resources, drop them in the comments.
A summarized list of the grievances against this “contest”, in no particular order:
— Assumes women and gay men aren’t interested in the game/don’t play games at all.
— Caters to the lowest common denominator of male game/comic fan: the drooling fanboy who can only get a date with a woman if he wins a fucking contest.
— Disembodied female chest and other sexist imagery used in the ad.
— Language that encourages sexual harassment of not only EA’s “booth babes” but every model at Comic-Con. (“commit an act of lust”)
— Women being offered as prizes.
— Prize worded in a way to imply the winner will get to have sex with the models; there is a word for this, and it’s prostitution.
— Women referred to as “girls”.
— All-around sleaziness and grossness, and an attitude that completely ignores and erases the RAMPANT harassment women, especially booth babes, have to put up with at gaming/comic/etc. conventions.
This contest ENCOURAGES the behavior that makes cons UNSAFE FOR WOMEN. PERIOD.
While !Finished 