Feminism/Sexism and Gaming/Geek/Popular culture Catch All

LarryC wrote:

I'm sure I'm missing a few beats there. How is going to the kitchen tied to playing Zelda and Sims 3? For that matter, what's wrong with Sims 3, anyway? My brother is a guildmaster who's usually orchestrating massive guild conflicts and raids in RF Online, when he's not playing the legs off of some JRPG dude or dudette. He still likes Sims.

"Get back to the kitchen" is a popular phrase for people to "jokingly" tell women off in most situations. It's one of those "jokes" that are really passive aggressive - people will try to say it's a "joke" if someone gets offended, but usually people use it in a really, genuinely condescending manner.

People who designate themselves "real gamers" tend to think of non-competitive sim games as "girl games".

Generally it's just a mishmash of stupid things stupid people say.

I think I may have used my sarcasm quote limit for the day.

Bloo Driver wrote:
LarryC wrote:

I'm sure I'm missing a few beats there. How is going to the kitchen tied to playing Zelda and Sims 3? For that matter, what's wrong with Sims 3, anyway? My brother is a guildmaster who's usually orchestrating massive guild conflicts and raids in RF Online, when he's not playing the legs off of some JRPG dude or dudette. He still likes Sims.

"Get back to the kitchen" is a popular phrase for people to "jokingly" tell women off in most situations. It's one of those "jokes" that are really passive aggressive - people will try to say it's a "joke" if someone gets offended, but usually people use it in a really, genuinely condescending manner.

People who designate themselves "real gamers" tend to think of non-competitive sim games as "girl games".

Generally it's just a mishmash of stupid things stupid people say.

I think I may have used my sarcasm quote limit for the day.

Personally, I get what it was trying to do, but I didn't think it was very funny. It's basically: "STEREOTYPES, LOLZ!"

I'd give it a B-. Good idea for a joke, poor execution, try harder next time!

KingGorilla wrote:

Lesson from that comic. Nerdy girls should know that nerdy guys can be dicks too.

Really? Nerdy girls categorically don't know this?

gore wrote:

Personally, I get what it was trying to do, but I didn't think it was very funny. It's basically: "STEREOTYPES, LOLZ!"

I'd give it a B-. Good idea for a joke, poor execution, try harder next time!

It's more "funny" if you can relate. It should be far-fetched but it's not so much, really.

clover wrote:
KingGorilla wrote:

Lesson from that comic. Nerdy girls should know that nerdy guys can be dicks too.

Really? Nerdy girls categorically don't know this?

I know, right. I've sure seen a lot of nerdy guys doing their damndest to make sure the nerdy girls don't forget it.

The punchline to me is still the prancing off on the last panel. I seriously laughed again at it just now. I should print it and put it up on my desk.

PS I want her shirt.

clover wrote:

It's more "funny" if you can relate.

Fair enough.

It should be far-fetched but it's not so much, really.

Ugh.

clover wrote:
KingGorilla wrote:

Lesson from that comic. Nerdy girls should know that nerdy guys can be dicks too.

Really? Nerdy girls categorically don't know this?

There is always a case zero.

Bloo Driver wrote:

The punchline to me is still the prancing off on the last panel. I seriously laughed again at it just now. I should print it and put it up on my desk.

It's so wonderfully "West Side Story". It's what takes it from B to A++++.

Is FF3j multi-player and no one told me?! Or was she expecting them to just watch her play with herself?

Mixolyde wrote:

Is FF3j multi-player and no one told me?! Or was she expecting them to just watch her play with herself?

Pass-the-controller co-op, maybe? I don't remember ever doing that with an RPG though.

Mixolyde wrote:

Is FF3j multi-player and no one told me?! Or was she expecting them to just watch her play with herself?

Can't tell if joking or not getting the point.

DanB wrote:
Mixolyde wrote:

Is FF3j multi-player and no one told me?! Or was she expecting them to just watch her play with herself?

Can't tell if joking or not getting the point. ;)

Oh God, the girl thought it was multiplayer.

Those mean men were right all along.

Not a fantastic or particularly new/insightful article except for a few lines, one of which is the title -

Oh God, Please Don't Let White Male Victimhood be the Next Big Social Movement

It makes a couple of interesting jabs at the false equivalence of it all, how the echo chamber tends to amplify sound, and what the only logical endgame is for some of these folks. To me, it's just interesting that this is actually gaining traction online. You'd think it'd be relegated to some of the more backwards and seedy alleys of the Internet, but I share the worry that this will be the next big movement that screams, "I'm just too real, not PC enough for you, you can't deal" self-righteously and attaches various beverage bags to its hats to rally in the streets.

Not quite sure where to put this, but here's an article in the Atlantic about signoffs in business email.

As e‑mail has evolved further and further from its postal roots, our sign-offs have become increasingly glib. While Sincerely or With best wishes might have been the ending of choice for a letter or a business memo, these expressions feel oddly formal when pinged back and forth in immediate, high-volume e‑mail exchanges. And so Sincerely begat Best begat Cheers and so on, until, somewhere along the line, xo slipped in.

At first, its virtual identity was clear: a pithy farewell, sweeter than See you later, less personal than Love. Men could xo their wives. Girlfriends could xo girlfriends. It was a digital kiss—meant, of course, for somebody you’d actually kiss. But soon enough, nonstop e‑mails and IMs and tweets began to dilute its intimacy factor.

I'm not in a position where I've seen this in the wild, but I thought the article was interesting enough to share.

Once again, the latest video by Anita Sarkeesian shows why one should never, ever read Youtube comments unless you are feeling particularly masochistic.

I did get into this in one of the web harassment or racism threads.

Living in a world where everyone has a 'valid' opinion and can express it, we realize that opinions are worthless crap.

We are seeing the death of a vestigial social construct where if someone takes time to write a letter, or talk to you, then you should listen and care. And this is good. In the future you will need a point, some degree of stature.

Go into the closed presidential campaign thread, see the online petitions.

Speech is cheap. And the world is mostly filled with people like your drunk uncle that you mom told you to ignore and avoid at X-mas.

mudbunny wrote:

Once again, the latest video by Anita Sarkeesian shows why one should never, ever read Youtube comments unless you are feeling particularly masochistic.

I came here to post this video, though by now the comments have been disabled, thankfully.

So apparently last week was modesty week in some town in California. I think this is a good example of groups of people agreeing that something is bad but disagreeing on how to solve it.

I can get behind the push for increased modesty among our country's young people. It's difficult to argue that the sexualization of primarily girls in pop culture is a good thing, but as this person points out, treating the female body as an object isn't solving the problem in a constructive way.

Seth wrote:

So apparently last week was modesty week in some town in California. I think this is a good example of groups of people agreeing that something is bad but disagreeing on how to solve it.

I can get behind the push for increased modesty among our country's young people. It's difficult to argue that the sexualization of primarily girls in pop culture is a good thing, but as this person points out, treating the female body as an object isn't solving the problem in a constructive way.

I think it goes deeper than just disagreeing on how to solve it. It's disagreement over what's wrong in the first place. There's a difference between saying girls shouldn't be pressured to sexualize themselves in their dress, and saying they should be pressured to NOT sexualize themselves in their dress. This call for 'modesty' looks less like empowerment, and more like replacing current misogynist pressures with older ones.

http://jezebel.com/5966552/memories-...

This was an interesting read. I think you're going to see some pushback based on the idea that she probably could have de-escalated some of these situations a little better. (Repeating, "That's why I'm a feminist" to the frothing screaming guy in the bar is probably not going to down as one of her wisest moments.) But that's not really the point, and it shouldn't be her responsibility.

To follow up on the Lego conversation from the beginning of the thread, my cousin posted this to facebook this morning. Interesting read, and I'm glad Lego is thinking about the issue.

Garden Ninja wrote:

To follow up on the Lego conversation from the beginning of the thread, my cousin posted this to facebook this morning. Interesting read, and I'm glad Lego is thinking about the issue.

I agree. But I'm also glad my daughter never realized that Lego was ignoring her with their Harry Potter, LOtR, and Star Wars sets.

FWIW, I like the ladyfigs. Being that the LOTR and Star Wars sets are character driven, I think LEGO should have done those in Friends styles rather than the usual.

Garden Ninja wrote:

To follow up on the Lego conversation from the beginning of the thread, my cousin posted this to facebook this morning. Interesting read, and I'm glad Lego is thinking about the issue.

It's nothing new though, just a report on Lego Friends, which basically creates a segregated, gender-role perpetuating, girls-only version of Lego City.

From SommerMatt's post on the first page:

Stengah wrote:
Garden Ninja wrote:

To follow up on the Lego conversation from the beginning of the thread, my cousin posted this to facebook this morning. Interesting read, and I'm glad Lego is thinking about the issue.

It's nothing new though, just a report on Lego Friends, which basically creates a segregated, gender-role perpetuating, girls-only version of Lego City.

So, I haven't had time to watch those videos, but how are "normal" Lego city sets gendered at all? They're just... buildings, cars, things? Why would a female child not like to build normal things with Legos?

They're certainly cashing in on the princess garbage too, but I don't see an actual gap in non-princess Legos.

That's the part where I think Sarkeesian is seeing something that just isn't there. I never thought of the mini figs as being excessively gendered, and both my sister and I played with the City sets no prob. Does it have it to be pink for it to be okay for a girl to play with it?

I had thought the article just came out, so I didn't realize / remember that the videos were referencing the same line. So the article is more of a lead in, than a follow up to those discussion on the videos, I suppose.

The basic thrust of the article, is that most of the stuff we discussed when this first came up (Are mini-figs male by default? Is "Pink = Girly" condescending?, What is gender specific about e.g. the City line?, etc), it doesn't matter because young girls think legos are for boys, and they don't play the same way that boys do. Not hypothetical future children who are immune to gender messaging. Actual children. Sure, messaging needs to change, but that is a long term goal. What I got from the article is that Lego Friends is a short term step towards that goal. Sort of a gateway toy, if you will.

The Article, on pg. 4 wrote:

The Lego Friends team is aware of the paradox at the heart of its work: To break down old stereotypes about how girls play, it risks reinforcing others. “If it takes color-coding or ponies and hairdressers to get girls playing with Lego, I’ll put up with it, at least for now, because it’s just so good for little girls’ brains,” says Lise Eliot. A neuroscientist at the Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science in Chicago, Eliot is the author of Pink Brain Blue Brain, a 2009 survey of hundreds of scientific papers on gender differences in children. “Especially on television, the advertising explicitly shows who should be playing with a toy, and kids pick up on those cues,” Eliot says. “There is no reason to think Lego is more intrinsically appealing to boys.”

Whether it will be successful, I don't know. Sarkeesian's response seems to be that Lego is missing the point, or tone deaf or whatever, and having read the article, I don't think that's fair.

The strongest gender messaging girls get are from their parents. Arguably, the ONLY messaging girls should be getting are from their parents. If young girls are getting the message that gender neutral toys are for boys, it's because their parents are sending them that message, or have left the shop untended and let bad media do so.

gore wrote:
Stengah wrote:
Garden Ninja wrote:

To follow up on the Lego conversation from the beginning of the thread, my cousin posted this to facebook this morning. Interesting read, and I'm glad Lego is thinking about the issue.

It's nothing new though, just a report on Lego Friends, which basically creates a segregated, gender-role perpetuating, girls-only version of Lego City.

So, I haven't had time to watch those videos, but how are "normal" Lego city sets gendered at all? They're just... buildings, cars, things? Why would a female child not like to build normal things with Legos?

Most of that came from the marketing, where it was dads and sons playing with Legos instead of moms and sons, moms and daughters, or dads and daughters.